Before I Fell Over the Rainbow
by giggleplex
Summary: What made Tea so fierce about friendship? A dark interpretation of how her life may have been like before; as a girl that despised society, and let it hate her back. Why live without a reason? COMPLETED. Happy ending!
1. All Appologies For Nothing

~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
I'm the cheerful one, that's what they always tell me. Even if it's the extremely-happy Yugi, the teasing Tristan, or even the silent glare of disgust from Kaiba. I usually ignore it, though I know it wasn't always true.  
  
/"You're life must have been perfect."/ they tell me.  
  
Oh how I wish that were true.  
  
I don't mean to sound so selfish in light of the pasts that my various acquaintances have led, but ~damn~! Loneliness is a thing that I could never handle. It was a wonder I had only attempted suicide three times before seventh grade, but the shunning anger, the upturned noses and all unfavorable opinions that led up to it . . . it's all infectious. Especially, it seems, when it's all directed at me.  
  
So this is a basic recap of my past before. Before love, before friends, ~before~ Yugi. Before happiness.  
  
And trust me when I claim a life without friends, is not a life at all, but a ~lie~.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
~~Before I Fell Over the Rainbow~~  
  
Told by the giggleplex, inspired by the mystery of Tea Gardener  
  
Dedicated to those too blind to see suffering beyond their noses, in a hope that they will recognize who they are someday  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
The teacher was trying to explain to the class another of the great wonders of life, but his sightly attention was averted to the crumbling white stick that he guided in incomprehensible patterns and formulas. Most of the class was attending with rapt attention, but a few allowed their consciousnesses to wander to a place far more interesting than Algebra.  
  
~She~ was looking at him, but all ~she~ heard was:  
  
/"What else should I be?  
  
All apologies.  
  
What else should I say?  
  
Everyone is gay."/  
  
Her name was Tea Gardener, though few knew it. Those who did were usually student government representatives or the like, who needed (for some stupid reason) to know ~everyone's~ name, and age; regardless of how they stood on the Bridge Middle School's hierarchy. Tea herself saw this as a bitter pity, for she had almost believed to set some sort of school record or something, not that she really would have cared.  
  
She was a bit taller than her peers, not yet out of puberty and granted a true schoolgirl's figure. Tea was just ~skinny~, enough that she wish she were otherwise, with a head nearly always hidden with a careless mop that was just about as course. Her eyes were dull, her eyebrows bushy, with unremarkable features as the completion of her face, that never betrayed her emotion, or so she hoped.  
  
/"What else could I write?  
  
I don't have the right.  
  
What else should I be?/  
  
She braced herself for the resolution that still made her stomach tumble.  
  
/"All apologies."/  
  
At that moment, her CD player was cranked up to the harshest volume, magnified about five times with the oversized earphones that hugged her ears to her head, and with the bass booming so loud, she knew she was attracting odd feelings. She felt her fingers drum on their own accord from pure, unmatched boredom, and the odd and rare nirvana she experienced in the innocent form of her CD player.  
  
No really, it ~was~ Nirvana.  
  
Still, it was fun to see the lyrics match up perfectly with the teacher's lips, as he lectured and droned to drones 'till his heart's content.  
  
/"In the sun . . . in the SUN I feel as one.  
  
In the sun, in the SUN  
  
I'm MARRied.  
  
Buried."/  
  
Her teacher was stupid, as were the rest of the so-called "honor's students" that were flocked around her in thick groups; designed for protection against those unworthy of their presence. But really, as Tea had long since decided for herself, they were spoiled preppies with clone-like matching fitted tees for the girls, and tastefully baggy jeans for the guys. Nearly all of them had their hair highlighted or bleached, giving further proof that they were really clone-failures gone rampant.  
  
She reclined and stared at the dreary sunny day. The sun sucked. It just reminded her of . . . everything.  
  
"MISS! PORTABLE CD PLAYERS ARE ~NOT~ PERMITTED IN SCHOOL HOURS!"  
  
That she could hear.  
  
Tea turned to face the purple man that was looking quite furious on the interruption he brought upon himself. They stared for a moment.  
  
/"I wish I was like you.  
  
Easily amused."/  
  
A girl with painfully straightened hair whispered and giggled with a ditzy air to her friend before handing him a note with his name written on it (Travis), and the "i" topped off with a little heart. How sweet.  
  
She straightened her flare, low-rise jeans and looked at Tea with a decidedly, superior look.  
  
/"Find my nest of salt.  
  
Everything my fault./  
  
EVERYTHING.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Her gaze unfocussed to the ceiling, her head rolling around her shoulders, as she hummed the song she didn't even have the chance to finish. This was officially the crappiest referral to the office she had ever endured so far, and she hadn't even been granted the audience of the Principal.  
  
Well shit.  
  
The faint and clinging scent of ink was oddly calming in light of the situation that should have been agitating, and she let her eyes gently close with the nudge of the ceiling fan's zephyr. She was propped up against the wall, not in a chair, because she didn't care for anything more comfortable than plastic.  
  
Tea heard the door open and close with great care. She didn't look up immediately, still savoring the sweetness of being alone and not harassed, though she expected it to come soon enough.  
  
But, oddly enough, it didn't.  
  
Surprised enough to be nearly startled, she turned with her eyes half- closed to face where the newbie was.  
  
He was short enough to be ignored, if it wasn't for the odd hair that stuck up in odd angles at shone in the yellow florescent light in three different colors, none natural. His head was down on his slight chest, as he gripped the side of the chair in which he sat with a nervous expectance that was nearly painful to watch. He seemed to sense her lax gaze, and he looked up to make eye contact.  
  
The eyes were large and melted into a rich, velvety violet that she had never seen before. In fact, Tea had never seen him before.  
  
"Hello . . . " he said shyly "Are you new here too?"  
  
She stared at him, temporarily too surprised to reply.  
  
"Unfortunately, I've been here as long as it was possible for my parents to enroll me in." she finally said, bitterly. He was too innocent to understand that he was talking to the one person in the entire school that he should never talk to. It was like unspoken ~law~.  
  
He looked back down. "Oh."  
  
"This is the waiting room for the Principal's office." She said dumbly, unaccustomed to a companion that was speaking to her under their own free will. Tea was somewhat disgusted for saying something so off-topic and stupid. The kid probably thought she was in special-ed or something.  
  
However, he actually looked surprised. Tea blinked, unsure if she was still daydreaming back in math.  
  
"Oh dear," he began wringing his hands, looking nervous " . . . i-is he intimidating?"  
  
Tea was relieved this was a topic she could relate and attest to. She was a regular in the face of Principal Wiseman, with amazing credentials that included over seven suspensions, three shouting matches, and a grand total of fifteen referrals. But wait, there's more! She achieved this all in the limited time of . . . (insert gasp here) . . . that year!  
  
"Not really. You just have to ignore the idea that you have ever, or will ever, do anything wrong."  
  
"Easy enough for you to say." Another awkward silence, as he studied the ceiling too "I thought you were new because . . . well, don't they group us together or something?"  
  
"Like cattle, usually."  
  
She was beginning to relax in the boy's presence, without even noticing. He was looking at her to continue.  
  
Tea pursed her lips in emotionless bitterness. "I'm just a casual observer." Thinking about others . . . "Unlike most."  
  
The boy's eyebrows contracted in concern "Should I worry?"  
  
It was his decision, wasn't it? /Stupid, why would he EVER waste his time being my friend anyway?/  
  
She responded distantly and curtly on the touchy subject she had thought had been meaningless to her.  
  
"That's up to you. I'm the outcast."  
  
He opened his mouth as if to respond, but started gaping when the ex- football star, Principal Wiseman, opened the door. The boy with the weird hair was silent, as was everyone in the room, when the man Tea had learned to hate, waved her in first.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"I'm worried about you, Miss Gardener."  
  
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the typical opening to the universal-all-purpose-lecture (tm). Mr. Wiseman's mouth was set in a grim line as he stared at her in the eye intently. Tea became suddenly interested in his assortment of pens on the right side of his desk, by the plant.  
  
He sighed, giving up. Wiseman ~knew~ that the girl wasn't a bad person, but she just didn't seem to care for anything other than her dreams. The dreams he knew she would never be able to make reality if she continued on the route she was going.  
  
"Do you have anything to say for yourself?"  
  
"Not really."  
  
It was frustrating, to see a student with so much potential just . . . disregard and toss it away. He tapped his pen on the hardwood surface.  
  
"Do you know why you're here?" Tap tap tap.  
  
"I think so. He sure was yelling at me loud enough." She didn't mean to share that much, actually.  
  
Wiseman sighed. Again.  
  
"Well, I'm afraid there is only one other alternative. Your period 6 band has been replaced with regular counseling sessions with our school councilor. I hope she will be able to convince you of what I have not."  
  
Her eyes burned dangerously.  
  
"Why?! I'm not insane!"  
  
He only looked at her, with a superior look that expressed he could never feel what ~she~ did constantly.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Yugi was concerned at the girl's indifference before, but that condition had steadily worsened when she stormed out of the office that was holding her captive. He could see the worried look on the Principal's face through the open doorway, but he knew, somehow, that that wasn't going to help her.  
  
The Principal was quite kinder than he had first appeared. He greeted Yugi with a friendly introduction to the school and it's numerous achievements, which would have been interesting if he hadn't been so preoccupied with his first acquaintance in this new town. Sensing perhaps that he was a bit feeble in the mind, he granted him a student to tour him around the school the next day.  
  
He was grateful (the school was so big!), but he had the feeling that "Annie Ivarson" was not the girl that preceded him in the bare office. And that was who he was most anxious to meet again.  
  
Her eyes were in so much pain.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
I was stricken at first with how much Tea/Anzu bashing has come about in this section. So much hate directed at perhaps the most down-to-earth, connectable character on the show.  
  
She's nice, and enthusiastic about things. If her dialogue drags on a bit sometimes, so what! I doubt everyone has a huge, love-connection with the rest of their peers, am I right?!  
  
Enough lecture, I judge you readers mature enough to look back over yourselves, and think. Sorry . . . so . . . *yawn* ~tired~ now!  
  
There's the beginning. Tell me if I should continue. Sleep now *snore*  
  
Please Review!  
  
giggle 


	2. Her Eyes Held So Much Pain

Oh my, I didn't suspect that so much good news would appear from such a contrasting chapter from the rest of the known YGO world. I'm very thankful for everyone's support; as I, just like any other writer out there, am fuled by sheer conquest and positive words.  
  
Thank you very much, it made me decide to continue this to the bitter end.  
  
However, I must warn you that it will just get more depressing, and oddly disturbing.  
  
I hope you will all stick with me until I pause it for good. Oh, and in case you were wondering, this IS a side-story to "The Sanctuary".  
  
Pleasant time to you all!  
  
giggle  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
"All right! We have all of the same classes, so this'll work out great."  
  
Yugi Moto, the latest student on the attendance records of Bridge Junior High, followed beside his new "friend" that the principal had recommended. She was blonde and tan enough to be a model, with sparkling blue eyes that were constantly immersed in an aura of happiness, and a jaunty gate that threw her pony-tail about wildly.  
  
In actuality, he found her quite disconcerting; no one could be that happy, and it was a sign of a very ignorant mind if they were.  
  
Despite her coldness, and obvious discomfort, he was wishing to himself that he could have toured the humble school with the girl he had met in the office. She was hurting inside so bitterly that Yugi ~knew~ he could help her somehow, before she destroyed herself in spite of neglect.  
  
Her hurt, hurt him. It was always odd, but then again, Yugi was amazingly attuned to his surroundings in an unnaturally empathetic way.  
  
He sighed, following obediently into a classroom with a murky window encased into the door, and trying not to look conspicuous to the handful of students skulking around. However, his guide (Annie), snatched his right wrist in a painfully tight grip and immediately led him over to what appeared to be a group of her friends.  
  
Yugi could tell they were friends; they all looked the same.  
  
"Hey Chicas!" she called exuberantly into their click "This is Yugi! He's new!"  
  
They muttered hellos with giant smiles on their glossed lips, and their eyes nearly closed. He felt the insincere emotion behind those smiles, but he returned the gesture politely, and fell back behind Annie to take a seat on the other side of their group.  
  
It was amazing how grippingly they gossiped, as Yugi was quite certain nothing of importance or relevancy came up during the full five minutes of conversation. Still, they seemed sincere enough, even if they had proven themselves quite shallow.  
  
The teacher was late; dragging his feet so that his movements matched the state of his unkempt hair and obvious headache. He gripped a decrepit old briefcase like a lifeline, carefully placing the old and frayed thing on his old and frayed wooden desk. With a cough, he looked up around the class slightly fondly (or was he?). Annie and her friends were still chattering.  
  
After convinced that there was nothing he could do to stop them, the teacher's gaze fell on Yugi for an extended time. The boy shifted in his chair nervously.  
  
"Ah," he said "you must be Yugi. Come up here please, and introduce yourself to the class."  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Tea kept her head lowered as she ignored the rude jostles and phrases snapped at her. Lunch was always horrible; because all of the teachers were happily marking "F"s into their grade-book, calmly ignorant of anything outside the teacher's lounge.  
  
"Hey loser! Where'd ya get ~that~ outfit?! The gutter?"  
  
Oh yes, she despised these thirty minutes of hell.  
  
Normally she could find hiding places besides the loud and cafeteria, but unfortunately, the bathroom on that hall was flooded, the gym host to a large dodge-ball game, and the band room closed due to a scheduled remodel. So she was now stuck with the jeering, sneering crowd that was overwhelming her sanity at that moment, and trying so very hard not to break out on a mad rampage.  
  
She found a seat in the most distant corner possible, sitting down without much fuss so that her baggy pants slipped up past the ankles of her gangly legs. Food didn't seem so appetizing to her at that moment, as she would be forced to venture into a crowded lunch-line to get it, so she simply pulled out a frayed fantasy novel from her old and worn backpack, and vainly attempted to lose herself in the perfect world, where all one had to worry about was the king's favor, taxes, and angry dragons . . .  
  
"Whatsamatter? Don't you have any ~friends~?!" laughter.  
  
Her nose was in danger of smearing the cheaply printed font, but she didn't really notice. /" . . . her eyes shone with the brilliance of healthy juniper, gazing adoringly at the entity that brought him there. To her. The most lovely thing he had ever seen in his life; . . . "/  
  
They were still laughing, though if it was directly meant to shatter her feelings still, she was unsure. The book was horribly cliché, but it gave her something to do with her eyes and hands, while she slumped from the chair as her hood and posture hid the humiliation of her shaking. To the students watching her as if she were going to unexpectedly pounce, her long eyelashes obscured the telling view of her watering eyes.  
  
She just couldn't hold them back now. So many years of being the resident target finally began catching up with her at that sad moment; she was so lonely.  
  
But Tea did not sob loudly, or wipe her hands on her face to make it go all blotchy and obvious. A few droplets of salty hate escaped, violating the slight curve of her cheek, and ruined page 457 before she halted it all easily. Crying was simply instinct, and never really helped anything in her life, so why waste the energy?  
  
She was so helpless behind the dispassionate mask . . . how disgusting.  
  
Carefully placing her book back into the small pocket of her oversized backpack, the zipper stuck enough to make her struggle for a while, before she forcefully slung it over her shoulder in a practiced motion. There was no need to stay any longer.  
  
One of the dangers of keeping your eyes downcast was that you couldn't really see where you are going as well as you should. It was this simple fact that was placed into affect when Tea smashed squarely into another person, forcing him to stumble back to the linoleum with a hiss of startling surprise.  
  
Judging by the absurd hairstyle she could glimpse through her hair, it was the same boy she had met earlier.  
  
"Oh! Hello . . . " he said shyly, shifting on the ground, expecting her to offer a hand up.  
  
Stupid boy. He could lose everything by talking to a worthless nobody such as herself, didn't he understand that?  
  
After a few moments of her cold stare, Yugi understood the idea as he hoisted himself up with the brace of a nearby table, dusted off his backside, and smiled generously. He loved to smile, but she didn't seem to. Straightened up, he could see little pain lines in-between her eyes, and his cheer faltered a moment to concern; she was in 8th grade, so why did she already have wrinkles?  
  
She was more frighteningly lost and depressed than he previously suspected.  
  
"I'm sorry, but I never had a chance to learn your name." he smiled, his eyes almost closed in a blissful expression. /Come on, just talk to me . . . /  
  
The brunette pursed her lips, examining the back of her hand. "Tea."  
  
It was strange, but his friendliness was astounding. Tea yearned to talk back, to converse about little nothings and just . . . she didn't know. But that would be a selfish response, and it wouldn't be long before he would be alone to her misery, blaming her for everything because it was all her fault . . .  
  
No, better to push him away before his mistake cost him more than he knew.  
  
"I'm Yugi," he introduced kindly "would you like to have lunch with us?"  
  
He pointed to a table that everyone in the room knew well to be a place to avoid unless you had a pristine record, pristine appearance, and an acceptation from the most popular of people around the school. Judging by the way one of the girls was calling out Yugi's name, he had every right to join them, but Tea didn't, nor did she ever wish to join the "blue table gang" under her own free will.  
  
Besides, she didn't want to spoil this new kid, just because he was new and therefore, naive.  
  
"I wouldn't touch that table with a fifteen-foot pole." She replied, frankly and turning to leave.  
  
"How about tomorrow then?"  
  
She made the mistake of looking back at him, and his god-blessed inhuman eyes. Yugi looked so hopeful and anxious, but even his most tender look couldn't melt away Tea's barrier of self-lies.  
  
"I doubt it."  
  
With that, she walked out.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"So, do you know why you're here?"  
  
"Pretty much."  
  
"You sound somewhat sarcastic, I have noticed. Do you think you should be here right now?"  
  
"You're asking my opinion?"  
  
"Of course. A compromise is the best way to agree."  
  
"No one else asks for my opinion."  
  
"Their loss then. Now, for an answer to my question earlier . . . ?"  
  
"Honestly, this is a complete waste of my time."  
  
"Hmm, you seem fairly certain then." Scribble scribble.  
  
"I don't need anyone else to tell me I have issues; I've already figured that out for myself, actually."  
  
Scribble, scratch ~cross~.  
  
"You think you have issues? What kinds?"  
  
"I guess I was giving you too much credit, my problems should be obvious if you open your eyes to reality."  
  
"That was very philosophical--"  
  
"Thanks."  
  
"--but I'm afraid we're not connecting. Why don't you tell me more about yourself?"  
  
"What do you want to know?"  
  
"Oh, just general information. You know . . . well, ~my~ name is Suzanne, and I like sunshine, pancakes and squash. I have a wonderful daughter who is off studying in America right now, a loving husband, and am very content with my life."  
  
/Obviously./  
  
"I sure hope your daughter hasn't picked up that smiling habit of yours, because your excessive use is quite irritating."  
  
"Tell me about yourself."  
  
" . . . my name's Tea, Suzanne, and I wish it were a pleasure meeting you, but that would leave us rather spoiled if we were happy all of the time, don't you agree? I don't like going outside, I don't like food, and I don't like people. I live with my single dad who is going through a rough (previously romantic) relationship with my aunt right now, though he's not home very often. I usually read when I don't have homework to pass the time."  
  
"Do you enjoy your schoolwork?"  
  
"Not in particularly."  
  
Scribble.  
  
"Do you like anything?"  
  
"I dance. I have practice every night."  
  
"Oh? What kind of dance?"  
  
"Ballet."  
  
"I used to dance ballet . . . I remember when I was picked for Clara in the annual Nutcracker; and I was so excited when I saw that nightgown, I--"  
  
"That's nice. Sounds dandy."  
  
"Alright. You seem to be in a crabby mood today, Tea--"  
  
"Don't call me Tea. Call me 'Miss Gardener' again, because that's too informal for a person like you. And it freaks me out."  
  
"~Fine~. Miss Gardener, have you been feeling weary lately, unnaturally so?"  
  
"I wish I was tired all the time, because when I sleep I don't have to talk to people, and in particular, I don't have to make unnecessary trips to the councilor every day."  
  
"Miss Gardener, send Mr Benson in after you."  
  
"Have a nice day."  
  
She was glad to leave the achingly stuffy room that was oddly plastered with self-esteem and anti-drug posters, so that you could no longer make out the chipped walls in between each message. The room was smaller than a closet; barely squeezed with enough room for an ominously dull lamp, a sparsely decorated desk, and a shifty wooden chair. Mrs Suzanne Smith was a slight-framed witch with frizzy curls that shocked from her thin face, and had a constant smile that appeared strangely as psychotic as she really was behind her cheery façade. Maybe the janitor's choice was purposeful; he was a shady looking guy too.  
  
Bumping the door open to unexpected light, Tea found herself looking into the same quiet waiting room that she had carelessly occupied earlier that morning, along with the unexpected arrival who she still worried about, deep within the darkest, dankest recesses of her mind. However, innocent little Yugi was long gone, and in his place loitered a rather unpleasant bunch that Tea was quite certain needed more help than just a third-rate- school-councilor.  
  
Without hesitation she sauntered emotionlessly to a particular boy dressed in baggy clothes and dark dreadlocks.  
  
"The Scare is out for your hide." She relayed.  
  
He looked up slowly, fixing her a pale stare with his disconcerting pale eyes. Benson was a creep.  
  
But he was as close as a friend as either of them had.  
  
"Shit, sweetheart, what did you do?"  
  
"Piss her off enough to listen to me."  
  
"Oh really," he gave her a feral grin, revealing slightly yellowed teeth and a questionable aroma "that seems unlikely."  
  
"It did seem unlikely. Then I got in a bad mood."  
  
He heaved himself up with incredible effort shown apparent on his face. Giving the girl a sliding little motion with his arms, he said one thing before making his own expedition to the little "Happy Room of Particular Happiness".  
  
"Meet me by the tree at lunch tomorrow. You look like you need to see what I've discovered long ago."  
  
Thinking it would be relatively harmless, she nodded and made a mental note to comply.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Any sort of truthful feedback *cough*review*cough* would be very much appreciated *bows*  
  
Thank you for your time so far! ^^ 


	3. Swan Lake: Dance of the Swans

Well, as it has been pointed out by a few of you (and I forgot to address the situation on my last update), it has come to my attention that Yugi and Tea/Anzu were childhood friends.  
  
Umm . . .  
  
Oli: *coughcough*  
  
*very long pause*  
  
Well, I'm human, and I'm sorry, but I hope this isn't TOO radical an idea . . . that it would seem entirely improbable. I should have looked it up, I understand, but I hope you guys can look past my obvious mistake before you condemn it.  
  
*fidgets*  
  
Well, if you're still here, I suppose that's a good thing! Yay! ^^  
  
I felt proud of myself because I updated "The Sanctuary" for the first time since, like, Easter. And my buddies still read it ^^ You guys are awesome, kickass people to make me feel all warm and cuddly inside like that.  
  
So many reviews . . . all so nice *swirly eyes* Wow. Thanks! I've never had this many reviews on a two chapter story before, so I guess I'm doing something right! Your comments and moral support are very thoughtful, and if you've gotten this far (even if it's not too long yet ^^;;;), I have a very important message that I don't want you to miss:  
  
THANK YOU.  
  
Disclaimer: If I owned YGO, it would probably end up like something that resembled "Serial Experiments Lain". And there would be shonen-ai cuteness (to battle stereotypes to the extremes!). Unfortunately . . .  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
"You're late." She noted monotonously, slamming the door shut behind her. The old Volvo station-wagon shuddered with irritation at her purposeful venting, and she felt it swaying over the tires before her father abruptly floored the gas.  
  
Tea's father didn't even bother looking at her.  
  
"I just got out of the office," he corrected pointedly "you know that. I actually got out a half-an-hour early today."  
  
With a confirming glance at her watch, Tea was quite well informed that though he had promised to pick her up at 4:30, he had an ambled entrance to the otherwise deserted parking-lot at a time nearer to 5:00. She shifted under the uncomfortable, unrelenting seatbelt as she turned her gaze back to the speeding freeway.  
  
The scenery was moving lackadaisically through the corners of her dead-like eyes, the dry hay and little dust clouds swaying; business as usual.  
  
Bracing the weight of her head against the palm of her delicate hand, she twisted a little to get a better gaze at her so-called father. She had lived with him her entire life, but never really knew him through his cool exterior. He had a carefully obscure soul, and that was something Tea had tried to model herself after ever since her mother died of cancer eight years prior.  
  
Harry Gardener would have been a handsome man--~was~ a handsome man--if he opened his eyes to a natural degree, shaved his face more than once every month-and-a-half, and if he smiled as much as he used to. But those eight years had taken his toll on him, and rather than embracing the child that was all he had left of his beloved Sylvia, he always looked at her with disdain that she was certain relayed to something along the lines of  
  
/"Why did they take my wife, and not the troublesome little girl who has given me such a hard time?"/  
  
His honey-brown hair was graying at the temples, and was often seen in a roundabout, unkempt fashion with the reassurance that haircuts were useless anyway. He often had, as he did now, a pair of plain sunglasses on to hide his weariness from staying up to, at an average, 1:00 AM every night. Tea always saw him hunched over from a habit caught from his faded gangliness, and though alcohol wasn't too much of a problem yet, he was a horrible chain-smoker.  
  
In fact, he lit a cigarette right then, rolling the window slightly to allow the wind to catch his ashes.  
  
She winced from the wind pounding painfully through her eardrums, striking against sheer delicacy. Tea always wondered why she was always so sensitive to sound, but it never made it any better. So she stopped wondering, and kept on wincing.  
  
Soon, she could feel the car slow from under her, alerting her that they were exiting the freeway. Looking up slowly, Tea spotted the most familiar intersection she knew; on the way to dance class.  
  
"You're bag's in the back seat," he grunted, but it was instinctive and routine, also something Tea was too used to, to pay attention.  
  
Grabbing her bag, she ran into the familiar studio with a dedication, a determination she couldn't find for herself anywhere else.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Dance studios were always crowded, funded, and decorated by dancers. And dancers seemed to have a strange fetish with mirrors.  
  
Even the narrow landing that connected the 'maple room' with the rest of the building had them gazing down neatly, reflecting the early-evening sun. As usual, a few of the other girls from Tea's class were fixing their hair back into severe knots, or wrapping the long pink ribbons from their shiny toe-shoes around their calves. Some were standing or leaning against the wall to admire themselves with the mirrors, while others socialized quietly on the painted wooden benches.  
  
Tea had to stop at the bathroom to change in one of the cramped, loose stalls before she made her way back to their makeshift waiting area, and to deposit her bag in a corner unremarkable enough for it not to be bothered. She took out some bobby-pins and some simple elastic bands before she rounded on her reflection to fix her hair back.  
  
She was always skinny, but the black, skin-tight leotard made her bony figure even more startling. Her collarbone was boldly shadowed in the orange-toned sunlight, and her impassive expression gave her an even more severe edge than her normal appearance.  
  
'Pretty' was a word she rarely used to associate with herself.  
  
Breathing steadily, Tea leaned against the window trim with one of her feet also bracing her weight against the wall. The world was so much simpler in a calm setting she loved.  
  
Her mother was a dancer, one of the best, who studied in New York. Her father didn't watch her practice anymore.  
  
She didn't really care.  
  
The click of the door opening and a quick exchange of apologies alerted her back to her senses, as Ms Hartman, or Gloria as she preferred to be called, greeted each of her students with a smile crinkled naturally in her semi- old face. She absently flipped up the sputtering lights to the room beyond, as she served as doorman with a red binder in her other idle arm.  
  
Tea allowed nothing to distract her from the resolution to get to the bars as soon as possible. In routine ease, her right calf naturally landed on the bar for an easy stretch through her legs, and soon she moved on to all of the usual positions she knew, so that none of her muscles would be pulled during that evening's rehearsal. Stretching not only eased her movement, but her cares for the world as well.  
  
"Alright," Gloria began, her hands rubbing together harshly after all of her students filed in. There were only eleven of them that withstood to that level, and Tea suspected that there wouldn't be that many for long. "today's a 'happy day'!"  
  
A few of the girls groaned at her unintentionally sarcastic opening.  
  
"You see, today is your surprise tryout for our annual production of the 'Nutcracker'!"  
  
"Oh my god!"  
  
"Are you serious?!"  
  
"What do you mean!?"  
  
"I meant precisely what I said, Miss Wiseman." Their teacher's eyes glittered wisely "In the real world, such short notice is usual for the big productions."  
  
"But we don't have a piece to dance!" one of the other girls protested, heatedly. Tea continued to stretch in the far corner.  
  
Gloria scowled.  
  
"I taught you that selection from 'Swan Lake' on Monday, didn't I?" she pointed out, looking inquisitive to her guilty students. "It's a lovely piece, and I think it will serve it's purpose wonderfully, that is, ~if~ you practiced it as well as I suggested."  
  
Their innocently dubious looks gave away their laziness for that week, as they looked to their silky pink slippers for inanimate support. The woman in front of them tossed up her hands and smiled very thinly and very frankly.  
  
"I guess your performance will dictate your casting for the show." There was no arguing to that statement. The girls splintered to their respective positions along the bars, looking shameful, and Gloria turned on the music to begin clapping for a certainly unmissed beat.  
  
Tea faced the mirror to check her posture, and stood as still as she could for Gloria's prompt.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Relaxing into a familiar 1st position in both her arms and her feet, she lifted her head to a steady, level gaze and focused on nothing in particular. Her arms curved, matching each other perfectly as half-ovals of themselves, while her spindly fingers spread slightly to a frayed edge of the shape. Her feet were simple and ready; with her heels braced against each other, leaving her knees not touching without being bent, and her toes flared to where her feet almost settled in a straight, unnatural line, but a strong enough stance to begin the piece.  
  
She felt one of her predecessors to the dance floor shift for her to continue, but Tea paid her no heed. Their foolish meanderings and innumerable false starts had wasted enough time already in their three-hour practice, and they felt the disappointment of complete and utter failure readily enough.  
  
/Steady enough?/ she twitched her feet into a more natural position as she wobbled slightly. She couldn't wobble now.  
  
They even watched silently, not taking any chance to Gloria's already sparked temper, which was harmless enough when she was calm, but when it was lit, it burned as easily as gunpowder. They also knew better than to demand a respite to the unfairness in it all, because it wasn't unfair at all. It was ~their~ fault they didn't practice precisely enough, and their positions in the Autumn Show would surely suffer from their lacking assumptions.  
  
One of the girls coughed. Tea glared without moving her head, and the girl's eyes widened with her hand over her mouth to prevent any further distraction. Wisened by the burned-blue look, she silently excused herself to the hallway, where she could cough without care.  
  
Returning her gaze to something that seemed familiar, but wasn't registering, she waited for Gloria's fumbling to yield to success for her music.  
  
"Are you ready?" she asked.  
  
"Yes."  
  
In the silent tension of anticipation, she heard a faint click and the whirring of the CD's faint scrambling to catch up with itself.  
  
The oboe acted as a knife to cut through it all, as it began one of the most familiar themes Tea had ever heard. It was the main theme of Swan Lake.  
  
/One, two, three, hop hop hop . . . /  
  
Insisting on perfection, she had drilled these movements in her body until ungodly times in the very early morning, but it was important to her. She didn't even have to think as the music just carried her to a faraway place . . . guiding her gently through all of the twists, leaps, and gestures of her constantly writhing hands.  
  
/This way, that way, bend------back. Rise./  
  
The music was inching into a hint of desperation now, the key changes to the embrace of "minor", creating a tumbling sensation through her stomach that had nothing to do with physical movement, and it threatened to consume her. So she let it.  
  
/Up./  
  
As the music grew more dramatic, and more sinister, she bent up on her toes, her toe-shoes smashing her feet in their worn molds. She cursed at herself silently for almost slipping, almost faltering in her perfect routine.  
  
The pain growled distantly, but she still danced. Pain just slowed you down when you thought about it.  
  
A collective gasp whispered around her as she moved to the most difficult portion of the routine. Tea didn't hear it, or if she did, she ignored it.  
  
Her world had melted into a dispassionate mist of . . . something. The music, the dance, the ~everything~.  
  
Pain was closing in on her vision.  
  
/Leap, down, down . . . down./  
  
Done. She was done. The music left, as did the mist; her blissful mist.  
  
They began clapping, and that was a response that none of the girls received before then. She breathed steadily, and smiled a rarely seen sincere smile.  
  
Tea closed her eyes, feeling her eyelashes tickle her cheeks lovingly, and her shoulders slacken easily.  
  
Then, someone screamed.  
  
"OH MY GOD!"  
  
Feeling the whipped alarm of pain nag at her again despite it's absolute dismissal moments before, she grimaced. And slumped to the ground. /My dance is done. My dance./  
  
She keeled over as there was more screaming, familiar voices shrilly expressing their terror, echoing through the roomy studio.  
  
/My dance was perfect./  
  
As she felt feet scamper toward her through slight shakes in the wooden floor, she finally twisted her head on the ground so that her hair twisted in tight protest, and looked at her feet.  
  
Red, blood, so much blood.  
  
Her toes' footprints were visible easily, leading a scarlet pathway to her pathetic position on the ground; little bloody puddles that were shining ominously in the florescent lights before they dried burgundy to a dull texture.  
  
The only immaculate pink shoes she wore were stained a deeper, darker shade than her toe prints, and were still dripping occasionally. People were talking above her . . . despite Tea's fading vision, she could tell her right foot was bent oddly, or was that just the water in her eyes?  
  
~*Drip*~, ~*drip*~, ~*drip*~.  
  
She had never seen anything so delightfully morbid. 'Delightful' because her dance was perfect, and so she still smiled.  
  
Drip. Pain. Sleep----  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"What's with the blood?"  
  
"Oh my god . . . oh my god . . . "  
  
"How the hell did she go for that long? Can't she feel pain?"  
  
"We'll need to get her to the hospital; they'll know what to do."  
  
"Oh," gulp "god."  
  
"Tea, Tea, Tea-girl, why did you push yourself so hard?"  
  
Her eyes fluttered open, but it took a moment for them to focus to the dimmed light.  
  
Everyone was standing around her, no, above her, their faces shadowed from any interpretation she could come up with for their expressions. It was then that she figured out just how much everything ~hurt~.  
  
"Ahh!" she hissed, trying to pull herself upright. Gentle hands firmly helped with her weight when she sat up, sweating from the effort.  
  
"Easy, Tea. You're in no condition to be pushing yourself right now."  
  
"How," she bit back another hiss of pain "how did I--do?"  
  
People around her began whispering, murmuring again. Tea's head and consciousness writhed and twisted inside her skull, as it shifted and shied from the pain.  
  
Gloria's faint frizz that surrounded the silhouette of her head caught the light beautifully. Her head didn't move, but she didn't reply until the whispers ceased.  
  
"Wonderfully, Tea-girl." She said at last.  
  
Tea's feet were numb with throbbing gasps, but she smiled, knowing that something had gone right.  
  
"So I'll be cast?" the most wonderful things were running through her head; little nightgown-clad Claras, thin candy-canes and snowflakes, dancing to the sugar-plum fairy's song. Maybe she would get to be the Sugar-Plum Fairy.  
  
"About that, sweetheart," she began, and Tea felt the most horrible surge of dread override any clear thought.  
  
Gloria squeezed her hand.  
  
"you have to heal before you can dance again. I'm so sorry. So, so sorry." Was she crying?  
  
"What do you mean?!" Tea sputtered, struggling with her elbows to get back up again. A few grains of unseen dust carved themselves into her skin, but it was little compared to what she was trying to ignore in her feet. "I can still dance--"  
  
"No, sweetie--"  
  
"I'M SERIOUS!" she yelled, powerfully gaining strength from the store deep in her chest "I can still dance! Watch."  
  
However, there were many arms that pushed her back down this time, despite her heated protests. Despite her reassurances /Everything's fine!/.  
  
When it became quite apparent that she wasn't going to give up any time soon, Gloria felt a tear run down her cheek. The girl was wonderful, and she was by far the best dancer of her age that she had ever seen. Her dedication was remarkable, but now she understood what little Tea Gardener really felt for dance.  
  
Obsession. A very dangerous obsession.  
  
It was so wrong. And yet, Tea knew that, and still she remained adamant about her position.  
  
"Tea, you'll have to wait until next year's production. God only knows how much you've broken, how much you've sprained." Even her heart ached at the harsh reality of the situation. The girl on the floor looked as though she thought she heard incorrectly, but this was no joke, or misconception.  
  
"But--"  
  
"Let me put it this way," /this is the only way you'll listen/ "I will not allow blood on my stage during the performance of a child's dreamy escape. Understand?"  
  
Tea's face was unreadable. Gloria, with all the control of a woman that could be her mother in age, had to use all of the control and concentration she ever possessed to keep from crying. So why wasn't Tea?  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"How was your day, Darling?" Suzanne Smith, feared councilor, looked back at her still-handsome husband lovingly as he firmly massaged her shoulders. That wooden chair in her office was so unbearable, perhaps she should bring a cushion tomorrow.  
  
The television flickered into wild ads about god-knows-what, ~violent~ things that influenced children so certainly those days. Not that she was complaining; she wouldn't have a job without those ridiculous messages.  
  
She switched on a heating pad under her back, and sank into her husband's skillful hands.  
  
"~Horrible~." Whoever said that adults couldn't whine? "A new girl came to me today, and she was SO difficult. It was almost like she didn't want to be listened to."  
  
"Hmm." He was an accountant, with a fairly good idea of how the world worked ((AN - Though we all understand that this is a falsehood, correct?)). Suzanne assumed that he was mulling her troubles over, so she felt contented once again.  
  
"Almost like a spoiled child." She remarked, signaling another grunt from him.  
  
"Well, they are the future." He started hesitantly.  
  
She snorted contemptuously.  
  
"And what a horrible future it will be. Thankfully, she's the sort that'll be on the streets in a few years, and hopefully, we won't hear another word about her."  
  
Her husband was dosing.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
I was debating on whether or not to add another scene with Yugi in it at the end, but it would be rather pointless, considering everyone knows how considerate he is from the shows and manga.  
  
The dance scene, I don't know, it seemed like the pacing was a little off, and perhaps the dance was too short? I had that in my head for a long time, so I would appreciate any comments contributing to that specific aspect of this chapter ^^  
  
Constructive criticism is not only accepted, it is treasured.  
  
Thank you so much!  
  
giggleplex 


	4. False Happiness

Yes, though it was a considerable delay, I haven't given up on this fic! (cheers)  
  
I must inform you, as a sort of disclaiming precaution, that this chapter was EXCEEDINGLY difficult to write, because it was rather dreadful. However, I promise, things WILL turn out better, so don't abandon my fanfiction or you might get nightmares. (that actually happened to me once)  
  
Rosz, (I think it was you) you have NO idea how right your assumptions are on the subject of Mr Benson. Yeah, I put it under the "angst" genre with a reason ^^  
  
WARNINGS: Depending upon your maturity, this chapter may be a little "darker" than a PG-13 rating. No sex, but some other themes that are very serious matters. I don't think it's that bad right now, but just remember to read my notes at the end, and be warned NOT to do this. Thank you.  
  
And so, the angst continues . . .  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Tea noticed a very constrained difference from other instances as she entered the cafeteria the next day.  
  
It was normally atrociously loud and crude, with rarely any semblance of order to constrain lunch to any sort of peace. The tables were segregated by social status, always warding that Tea didn't really fit in anywhere; she didn't have the grades to be a nerd, wasn't athletic enough to be a jock-ette, and wasn't pretty enough to be /popular/. She always knew that the tables would reflect the same clashing colors that illustrated the raucous behavior she knew so well.  
  
But today, even the colors seemed dulled.  
  
Her crutches were becoming easier to control throughout the morning, and though they didn't slip on the polished linoleum under her one intact foot, she could easily hear them squelching and squeaking their merry way with the rubber cushions that capped off the wooden sticks.  
  
Involuntarily, a hush came over the room as she struggled through the open doorway. Furrowing her eyebrows in momentary startlement, her impassive mask slowly reverted back to it's normal despair when she realized everything.  
  
/They . . . pity me./ it dulled her control, signaling a gaping bubble of anger, sorrow, and disgust to grow somewhere near her thin ribcage. This was humiliating; she was absolutely helpless, and yet it seemed . . .  
  
She gave a weary snort. Pity. Why the hell were they /pitying/ her?!  
  
She didn't need to handle that crap.  
  
Violently shuddering once over her aching armpits, in an emotion she did not bother to understand, Tea left the cafeteria with her head downcast so no one could see her face. This was no place for her. Teasing, she could handle, tripping, she could handle, jeering, she could handle. But pity was false care, and she had so much lack of true care in her life at that moment, the substitution only reminded her of the worse.  
  
She hadn't really planned on actually taking Benson up on his offer, but he was probably the only one high enough not to pity her. At least he understood when he could.  
  
So she headed out for the large sakura tree, barely in the courtyard, not noticing the pair of large, purple eyes that watched her go, sadly.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
The sky no longer stretched endlessly in a cloudless blue haze, but was cushioned comfortably on cotton clouds that dulled the sunlight. The week of unrelenting sun had taken it's toll farther than Tea's discomfort, however, and everything seemed hazy and dead with it's brown appearance. She could feel the dry grass crumble beneath her crutches, and little itchy pieces of dead plants were already attaching themselves to her socks.  
  
Only one part of the courtyard didn't rate the worthiness of regular watering; the farthest, roughest and most uneven bit of land that was far enough to avoid students regularly.  
  
This was where the sakura tree grew. Though, it was unlike the neighborhood blossoming trees in the way that it was thin, brittle and sickly to the droop of it's delicate branches, already suffering from some sort of disease. It was simply a shadow of any expected splendor that such a normally beautiful type of tree usually radiated, and coincidentally, ignored most of the time.  
  
Struggling up the shifting, rough ground with her walking supports, she managed to grit her teeth and pull herself beyond the most dramatic rise in the earth that hindered her path. Dust shifted, and for some reason, she smelled sickeningly pine sap in the dry air.  
  
She wrinkled her nose and sneezed.  
  
"Hey girly." A deep voice noted quietly "I didn't think you would come."  
  
Benson's back was hunched as far as she could tell, behind the crumbling trunk. He didn't crane his neck to look at her, just leaning with his hands permanently dipped in the pockets of his worn, black pants. She caught a faint sparkle reflect off of his silver wallet-chain that twitched when he spoke.  
  
"I didn't plan to."  
  
There was no wasted sentiment between the two of them, for they had seen enough to understand anything 'polite' was just an excuse for the world to feel better. They had a peculiar outlook on society, being at the very bottom, but they saw through it all, and suffered for it.  
  
Benson and Tea held what could scarcely be considered a 'friendship', but they each held a sort of acceptance. And for them, even being simply 'accepted' left them enough room to elbow their way through and belong.  
  
As Tea slowly and painfully sank to the rough ground with the support of the groaning tree trunk, the dreadlocked boy beside her ended the inevitable silence.  
  
"Bad day?" though he normally reverted to any of his facades after facing her, he allowed a ghost of the clever smile he usually smiled. Usually hating it, just like the rest of himself.  
  
Her hair, even from the dead-like lack of wind, was matting naturally, and Tea brushed it back behind her ears with her fingertips.  
  
"Worse."  
  
He snorted in understanding. For once, she knew he understood, as others wouldn't.  
  
She knew little about Benson besides what emotions his mask didn't filter out to cocky cleverness. He was her age, lived in conditions a bit on the poor side, and alone with his seemingly mute uncle. Just another "happy-go- lucky" kind of kid.  
  
Tea sometimes noticed the scars, the bruises, and his grimaces nearly entirely controlled with practice. She respected his privacy, but he knew she knew something closer to the truth than he ever let on.  
  
With his delinquent behavior, surfaced from the idea he didn't really ~care~, and cocky attitude toward what should be ~powerful~ entities, most avoided him beyond a casual greeting in the hallway. Which, of course led to the unstable rumors circling that he was a teenage drug-addict.  
  
Tea kept her distance, though she didn't mind it much. She wasn't picky about things like that.  
  
"So, why are we here?" she asked coldly, with a contemplating stare at the run-down neighborhoods on the other side of the chain-link fence.  
  
"I wanted to show you something." He said at last, fumbling for a plastic bag in one of his numerous pockets.  
  
Tea felt a cold sort of dread begin to spread queasily through her stomach as she identified the bag's contents. It looked like trash, but it could all ruin your life, as it had for so many others.  
  
"You know I'm not into pot, Benson." She spoke quietly, still staring at the bag "I tried it before, remember?"  
  
He just shook his head at the ground, that strange ironic smirk on his face yet again. Drawing his fingers through his mop of dreadlocks idly, he shifted his position a little, but still didn't look at her, as she didn't look at him.  
  
"You didn't need it back then."  
  
Tea looked up at the stained-gray sky as her lips contorted into a tightened expression, but she stayed silent, because she knew her life was a lot more screwed than it was before.  
  
" . . . So? That stuff costs money, and I'd rather not fall into that sort of business."  
  
Benson stiffened, now grasping the bag with both hands in a decidedly pained look. Tea looked at him squarely for the first time that day, noting the dark circles under his eyes, the helpless slouch, and the nervous way his lip was shaking. "I'm not asking you to, I just want to get rid of it." He said through clenched teeth.  
  
Her eyes narrowed. "Nothing's for free, these days. Why me? Are you trying to quit or something?"  
  
His smile came again, now looking very odd with his frightened appearance.  
  
"No, I've got that handled."  
  
She snorted.  
  
"Bull. You've been on that crap for three years."  
  
"Well, I can't get high when I'm dead, now can I? And I should be dead soon. I wonder how many bullets they'll waste on me?"  
  
Tea felt her stomach give a very unpleasant lurch; she blinked. Surely she didn't hear correctly.  
  
"What?!"  
  
Benson looked up with an unreadable expression on his face.  
  
"Long story."  
  
"I have time. We both do."  
  
It seemed as though he wanted to talk to her all along, when he let out a long breath that whistled slightly through his teeth. Then he began.  
  
"I should never have gotten into this shit." He shook his head down at the dying grass "I should have stopped. But some pain can't be just ~ignored~, and it was like my lifeblood. And I kept bleeding.  
  
"I guess it never struck me how true the movies are like these days, because the drug-lords have so much stuff; stuff that makes people keep on living, you know? But they know that more than anything."  
  
Tea listened in dark fascination, fiddling with the hem of her pants and tearing up grass. He gave no notice that he cared, but the both of them understood that they cared about little in those times.  
  
"So, a while back, I met this dude. He seemed fair and happy, and he asked me if I'd like a free sample, type. Free chances don't come around too much, so I took up his offer. Then I figured out that ~that~ stuff was a shitload stronger than what I'm usually into."  
  
/Oh god . . . ~crack~./  
  
He was lost already.  
  
"But it was good. Real good. So I ordered more, as much as I could pay for in a month or so.  
  
"Then, when I got my package, I found ~three times~ as much as I ordered. I'm not sure if they did it on purpose, but it's not like it's refundable.  
  
"And I can't pay it." He swallowed "It won't take long for them to figure it out. So." He looked expectantly at Tea.  
  
"Join me?"  
  
She knew it wasn't a good idea, all things considered, but it drew her as a promise of something different. And it wasn't like anything could get any worse for either of them.  
  
Maybe she could be happy.  
  
Carefully, she took the roll into her delicate fingers, looking it over. How could something so small be that harmless . . . ?  
  
"I'm not trying to ruin your life, girly." He said somewhere above her "It's ~worth~ it."  
  
Finally, she looked up. He held a lighter in his hand.  
  
"Kanpai?"  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Yes, it was bad, but for once, the pain ebbed a little.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Don't flame me. I'm not a crack-head, I don't know how these things work. I left a lot of it to your imagination, of course, but remember kiddos:  
  
Don't do drugs.  
  
Well, I sincerely hope this chapter was adequate for your needs, but if you absolutely hate it, just tell me, alright? However, remember, it'll get better near the end, even though Tea got herself into a very BAD position. Expect about four more chapters in all, perhaps a bit more, but four is my estimate at the moment.  
  
So, Yugi's coming back in, next time, and with a few words of wisdom. Now the question is, will Tea heed them?  
  
Please review, any comments are welcome as long as a valid point is introduced.  
  
Thank you so much!  
  
giggleplex 


	5. Rain::

Not as angsty as the rest; I loved writing this chapter. But the remnants of the last, the beginning of this, were hard to pick back up again.  
  
Oh yeah, and life sucks right now. Hope your lives are better than mine, and I especially hope you enjoy my writing, as limited as it is.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
She was still nauseated and slightly dizzy, but glad that no one was milling around the hallways to see her in such an embarrassing state. Her eyes unfocused again, causing her to swing with a pronounced *~CLANG~* into a nearby locker and she groaned in self-sympathy.  
  
Tea's stomach gave another unpleasant lurch and she shut her slightly tearing eyes; sticky and contorted.  
  
After a moment, her sight settled and she opened her eyes in a squint, only to find them still blurry and unfocused. She closed them again.  
  
It was a good thing that her father was on a business trip and left earlier that day, because she had no idea what time it was and that could easily resolve into some unwanted questions. The smell saturated into her clothes was sickly-sweet and suspicious, complimenting her messy hair and disheveled presence. Of course, she had yet to look over herself, but that was what she assumed she looked like--what she ~felt~ like--  
  
Benson was keeled over, but breathing when she somehow made her way across the courtyard, somehow, in her wobbly crutches. Or if it was wobbly world, she couldn't tell.  
  
Her ears pounded and she constantly heard an almost mechanical buzzing deep within her ears, which didn't help her nausea whatsoever. Tasting bile, she crouched into the harsh grip of the locker, feeling somehow that she was a little ball, completely oblivious to the outside world, and was grounded enough not to know the difference.  
  
Predictably, this wasn't a successful venture.  
  
"Um, Tea? What are you doing here?" asked a small voice--somewhere.  
  
She looked up. Even in her haze of sickening helplessness, she could recognize that hairstyle anywhere, bobbing under her initiative and framed painfully with florescent lights (one of the only sets still on). Tea had slid down the locker so that her legs were propped up in right angles, and her wrists hung lazily across her knees. She squinted, not even bothering to compose herself in front of this--nuisance.  
  
"What are ~you~ doing here?" she returned bitingly and averted her eyes to a glare down the spinning hallway as they went lidded, broodingly.  
  
Yugi gave a nervous laugh.  
  
"Um, well, there was a 'game club' meeting today after school, so that's why I'm here so late. And--ah--you're leaning on my locker."  
  
Tea gave a startled jolt, and returned her gaze to the smaller boy, but wasn't really seeing. She grabbed her crutches and heaved herself over a few feet, and slumped back down.  
  
But Yugi wasn't going to let her get away that easily.  
  
"You never answered my question."  
  
"Did you think I had any intention of doing so?"  
  
Struck by the bitterness in her tone, he opened his locker to block her from his view, and so she couldn't see his momentary expression of hurt. He was great at reading others through their faces, but not very skilled at hiding the view of himself through his own. Drawing out an umbrella, a coat, his backpack, and his puzzle, he closed the door firmly, only to realize that the girl sitting beside him hadn't moved in the slightest.  
  
"Well, I guess I'll be going now. D'ya want to come out with me?"  
  
"No."  
  
Yugi laughed, but it was breathy and shallow "Alright then. I guess I'll see you tomorrow at school!"  
  
After his back was turned, she watched him leave. His step was cheerful and bouncy down the hallway, as he walked through slightly light shapes coming down from the high, rectangular windows. She noticed that the hall looked kind of blue for some reason, and the scene seemed almost surreal as if it was painted directly by a famous expressionist.  
  
After a while, even as he turned to the next hallway, she heard a door bounce close.  
  
Still, she stared after him, for a little while longer. The hallway steadied, and she felt strangely at peace with herself; just not with her stomach.  
  
Tea sat for a little while longer, contemplating dully about what she would do if a janitor saw her there after school hours. It probably wouldn't be an enjoyable experience, to say the least, and as she became more and more conscious of that thought, she made a decision to vacate the premises.  
  
But she sat for a little while longer, wondering if she could get up again. That was when she noticed the winking of gold out of the corner of her eyes.  
  
It was a small trinket, but somewhat bulky for a necklace, as the chain around it was obviously for, and was so bright Tea wondered if the thing was solid gold. The edges were slightly uneven, like a 3D puzzle's, but the strange eye insignia on the face of the pyramid stood out boldly, almost vainly.  
  
Yugi must have left it. Wondering why she was feeling generous to the rather nosy kid, she slowly picked it up, only to drop it with a hiss as it fell with a clank.  
  
What the hell? That thing ~burned~ her!  
  
She shook herself mutely, immediately dismissing the notion just as it was conceived. Yugi handled the thing just fine, so what was up with this?! Probably just imagining things, and even though Tea wasn't the kindest person in the world, she was determined not to let a stupid necklace keep her from whatever she wanted to do. She had enough stifled experiences in her life.  
  
"Look, I'm going to take you back, you bloody piece of jewelry!" she told the trinket coldly, barely wondering why in the world she was talking to an inanimate object.  
  
Tea shook herself, angry enough to forget her nausea momentarily and violently took up the necklace in a bony, claw-like hand, finding it as pleasantly cool as it appeared. Swiftly, she got back up and took her crutches, feeling the chain grind into the bones of her right hand as she hobbled out the entrance of the school.  
  
She didn't even know where Yugi lived, but she walked purposefully to the right, and down the street.  
  
A gigantic roll of thunder drummed deeply in the distance.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
She cursed. Cursed the most vile things she could come up with. Cursed them twice over in every language she knew.  
  
Tea slipped on the smooth sidewalk; not so smooth when she hit it. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to ignore the absolute downpour for a moment and right herself up again, gripping the slick crutches and just trying her hardest not to slip again.  
  
It was cold, wet and dark from the stormy clouds that brought night early that evening. She knew it was very close to hail from rain, and instinct was yelling at her for not seeking shelter, but practicality dully reflected that it wouldn't matter anyway.  
  
Before, she had taken refuge under a dingy sort of gazebo just as the rains had begun, assured with a scowl that it would pass soon enough. But it just got worse as time went on, and she had no intention of camping out in a public park.  
  
No cars passed by anymore, and she knew it was long past rush hour, still trying to ignore the idea of people drinking warm milk beside the fire, and stroking a cat without a care in the world. It would have normally made her gag, but even something as ridiculously tender as that seemed more appealing than being stuck out in the rain, wondering why the hell she was bothering for all this just to take back a stupid necklace that a kid had left behind.  
  
It took an agonizingly long time just to walk one short block away, but she felt a sense of reprieve as a neon sign contrasted brightly from the storm. It read "Turtle Game Shop", and sat above a quaint little store on the corner of the next block.  
  
Somehow, she knew Yugi would be there. She tightened the grip on the chain, and continued the journey to the meaningless effort.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
He was feeling oddly blank and--incomplete without the puzzle's comforting weight around his neck as he brought his knees up to his delicate neck. Flinching violently as another flash of lightning fled through the wide sky- light in his room, Yugi shut his eyes before fleeing downstairs.  
  
At school, he was worried his normal style of clothing might violate the dress-code, but wearing black was always helpful for his nearly indestructible self-esteem. At that moment, he wore a simple black tank-top with matching baggy pants that jingled merrily with all of the buckles, zippers and silver fasteners you could imagine. The tune they danced in was oddly merry, and with a giggle, the tune of 'jingle bells' came flooding back into his mind.  
  
"Yugi, was it in your room?" came the gentle voice of his grandfather. Yugi turned just in time to see his head bob above the sculpture of moving boxes.  
  
"No . . . I remember taking it out of my locker." He responded, looking sad. "I just don't like the thunder." He laughed sheepishly.  
  
His grandpa stepped carefully over the boxes to look at his grandchild, who was trying vainly to hide his appropriate fear.  
  
"Well, I'm sure it will turn up sometime in school tomorrow." Solomon said firmly.  
  
"I guess . . . "  
  
Both of them jumped as the unfamiliar doorbell rang through their home, immediately followed by another clap of thunder. Looking quizzically at each other, they raced down to the shop, wondering who was outside at a time like this.  
  
The windows hid the figure on the other side with shadow and their own reflection, but Yugi opened the door all the same, feeling the remnants of rain slowed by the slight cover outside the door.  
  
A sodden hand held out a mischievously familiar object to him, and he looked up to see clear blue eyes, still burning brightly through the storm.  
  
"Here," she said "you forgot this at school."  
  
"Tea?"  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
After much fuss on the two males' part, Tea found herself shivering in large, fluffy towels that smelled like roses, and nursing a hot cup of green tea that was actually warming her chilled hands. They had told her to sit on the couch, which she was only too willing to do, watching a "Speed Racer" marathon while she warmed up.  
  
Yugi and who she supposed was his grandfather returned with more tea and some still-steaming tempura that made her mouth water, despite her still- sodden appearance.  
  
"Tea," Yugi's voice was quiet with concern "why did you go all the way here in the rain?"  
  
A distant rumble of thunder seemed to emphasize his question, and another flash of lightning fully illuminated his face.  
  
She averted her eyes, feeling very stupid about herself for forcing them to charity.  
  
"You left your necklace," she deadpanned "and it's not like I had anything better to do."  
  
"Thank you."  
  
"Whatever."  
  
"Do you like tempura?" he asked with renewed cheer.  
  
Tea watched him oddly.  
  
"I don't think I need to cause you any more trouble, Moto." She made a move for the door, just as Yugi gently grabbed the sleeve of her shirt, forcing her to look into those strange violet eyes again.  
  
"No!"  
  
"You can't expect us to let you go out in ~that~." His grandfather spoke up sternly "It's dangerous!"  
  
/Can't say it's ever stopped me before./ Tea thought to herself.  
  
"Listen, Tea." She flinched at the sound of her name "It's no trouble at all, really!"  
  
"Should you call your parents?" the old man said "It won't be long before even our reserve power's out."  
  
"My dad's out on a business trip." She shrugged.  
  
"Then you can stay here for the night."  
  
Tea made the mistake of looking into those eyes again, and she knew she couldn't protest any longer, on any subject that opposed them.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
They gave her a large pair of flannel pajamas after she guiltily stuffed herself silly, much to the strange delight of Yugi's grandfather. Solomon pulled some blankets out of a cupboard in the hallway that held the stairs, setting them up without request on a comfy looking couch in front of the television set.  
  
She felt uncomfortable in their generous presence, still not entirely sure ~what~ they were doing this for. Maybe that pyramid ~was~ solid gold or something.  
  
Tea brushed her teeth with the spare toothbrush in her backpack, even if she didn't use it much despite her braces.  
  
After being satisfied with her physical comfort, Yugi's grandfather bid them both good night and journeyed upstairs to retire in his own bed.  
  
A few minutes later, Yugi (clad in ~black~ pajamas?) appeared as she was staring idly to the ceiling with another pillow and a flannel sleeping-bag. He dropped his burdens on the floor, and turned, only to smile at her.  
  
Unable to think of anything to say that didn't sound offensive, she settled for what she was thinking:  
  
"What are you doing here?"  
  
"Oh," he scratched the back of his head in a somewhat--cute--manner, "I can't sleep in my room during lightning storms. You can see the flashes through my sky-light, and . . . I'm kind of afraid of lightning."  
  
He flinched at the thunder for unexpected effect.  
  
When it became apparent that she wasn't going to patronize him any longer on that subject, he fluffed up his sleeping bag in front of the couch, and slipped in while straightening his pillow. The power suddenly went out, plunging the entire scene into darkness.  
  
They could hear the pounding of the rain from upstairs; hardly a comforting sound to fall asleep under. She burrowed into the old blankets, smelling of 'spring fresh' scent, and the same rose one that the towels smelled like as well. It was intoxicating, but insomnia was roused, and there was nothing she could do about it.  
  
But it was Yugi who began conversation again.  
  
"You must be happy to have a dad." Came his voice, through the darkness "To not have a broken family."  
  
Tea snorted. "He's all I have. I think you have a better idea of an unbroken family than I do."  
  
" . . . but at least you remember him. My mother died when I was six, but I can still remember her swinging me around . . . and laughing . . . "  
  
She thought of her own mother, who was too weak to even pick her up, and couldn't laugh without coughing. Yugi's memories seemed far from what previous reality she knew.  
  
"Sounds like a perfect relationship. The stuff that only happens in bad movies."  
  
For a while he didn't say anything. Then "It was better."  
  
Tea shifted her position, and found herself staring to the area of pitch- black darkness where Yugi lay.  
  
"My dad doesn't like me."  
  
"What?!"  
  
"I think he can barely put up with me, ever since mom died."  
  
"Why do you say that?"  
  
"I think I remind him too much of her."  
  
"That's strange."  
  
"Not for me."  
  
"I guess . . . " Yugi considered for a second "I think he still loves you."  
  
"You obviously haven't seen my father."  
  
"No--but if I were in his place, I think . . . that he just hasn't been able to let out his sadness and stuff."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Oh, well, everyone needs someone to talk to, especially when someone you love dies. I had grandpa. But I don't think your dad had anyone."  
  
"There were enough people at the funeral to dump all his sorrows on." She said bitterly, closing her eyes.  
  
"Yeah, but you were the only one who really understood."  
  
She opened them again, suddenly struck by his words, and their thoughtful sincerity. Now that he pressed beyond her shell of doubts, the notion seemed oddly appropriate. /Oh god,/ she realized /how could he have felt?/  
  
Tea swallowed a lump in her throat, born of shame.  
  
"Maybe." She turned back into the back of the couch.  
  
"What was she like?" he asked suddenly.  
  
"Who?"  
  
"Your mom."  
  
She let out a breath. Slowly.  
  
"She was . . . weak." Tea admitted "I guess that I never really understood what that could mean until she got sick. Well, she was always sick, but, I only figured it out when she was in the hospital."  
  
She could still see the white-washed walls, and her, in the depths of white sheets and her face as pale as her surroundings.  
  
"I don't remember much about what she looked like besides the obvious things; that she had brown hair and brown eyes. She was a dancer once, the best dancer I had ever seen, and I wanted to be just like her . . . even if I only saw her dances recorded on videos."  
  
"What kind of dance?"  
  
"Ballet and some modern."  
  
"I bet you're really good at dancing, too."  
  
"I--" she felt the splint on her leg clearly, brought about from foolishness.  
  
"Never mind." Yugi said hastily "What else do you remember?"  
  
"Hospital walls."  
  
"Is that it?"  
  
"No." she delved deeper into the long-since abandoned passageways through her mind, trying to remember everything "She was so pretty," her old way of speaking escaped with the old realizations "she played a flute, and I used to watch her and--"  
  
It became too much to bear.  
  
"What about you?" she said at last "What was your mom like?"  
  
"She was the strong type of person, I guess. Always doing her fair share of work and more, not depending on anybody for things she knew she had the possibility of doing. We lived with grandpa, and the three of us used to go out on--picnics."  
  
"How did she die?"  
  
"Struck by lightning."  
  
Tea mentally berated herself for her untimely comment "I-I'm sorry," she said awkwardly "I didn't have any right to--"  
  
"No, it's okay." Yugi assured, but a little shakiness crept into his voice all the same. He sighed. "I'm not going to get any sleep tonight anyway."  
  
"I can't talk to people very well." Tea commented abruptly.  
  
"Well, you can't expect to without opening up to people as a friend." He said, sounding amused.  
  
"Why do you trust me?"  
  
"I don't see a reason not to."  
  
"That's an odd contrast to what's happened in the past."  
  
"Well, this is the present. You might as well get used to it." His voice still sounded generous in all it's curtness.  
  
Tea sighed into her borrowed pillow.  
  
"It's harder to forget what's happened before than you think."  
  
"There's no reason to forget." He said softly "you can never learn from your past if you just destroy it. No, I've found that all you need to do is hide it away for a while, until you need it when it catches back up."  
  
Tea looked over to more blackness in surprise. It was one thing to realize that this nerd could not look at her condescendingly from her grades and delinquent record, but another to realize that this kid, despite his childish appearance and too-sunny smile, was as wise as he was. For the first time in ages, she began thinking closely about things that she had simply brushed away before, unable to accept . . .  
  
. . . That there was something beyond the surface.  
  
"Tea?"  
  
"What?" she whispered.  
  
"Goodnight."  
  
"Goodnight--Yugi."  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Authoress' Notes:  
  
All things considered, that was a long chapter by my usual standards, which only took me about a day to complete. It was a relief to write about something a little happier, and I hope it's a nice contrast to all of the angst in the last chapter.  
  
However, the next chappie will probably the most angst-ridden thing I will ever write. That's it, though. After that, it's all good-in this story, anyway.  
  
I can understand if most of you stayed clear of the last chapter, but the lack of response shook me up quite badly. It was very difficult for me to write, however, I sincerely hope you like this one better.  
  
I tried to make you hate the last chapter. I just hope you haven't given up on it altogether.  
  
This ficlet will have a happy ending, I promise you.  
  
Sayonara, minna-san  
  
giggle 


	6. Suicide is Rainin Pain::Last Dance for M...

WARNING: SERIOUS ANGST AHEAD. Not the end, though.  
  
Oh yeah, and I wrote the song at the beginning, a pity I can't sing it for you . . . sorry in advance.  
  
"Mary Jane's Last Dance" belongs to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Not really a big part here, mind you, but still . . .  
  
. . . Please don't abandon this--yet.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
How can I see the world  
  
As it, hurts me so  
  
Utterly and completely in  
  
It's hopeless and dreaming  
  
Hey, go away  
  
Simply fly away  
  
Drift to a place where I  
  
Wish that I could find someday  
  
But the world is cruel in ways  
  
Mocking me watching me  
  
The waves I cannot realize  
  
Still holding me uptight . . .  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
The pounding of the too-hard pressed marker on the glossy white-board was the dominant sound in the classroom. In fact, besides the occasionally gusting air-conditioner and the trembling machinery that activated a little rattling sound along with it, the room was silent.  
  
Tea shifted in her waxy seat for the umpteenth time in the past fifteen minutes, mending her position to survey the clock in the corner--and again, it hadn't even been half of the class, yet. She gave a quiet, helpless little groan in discontent, coming from the back of her dry throat.  
  
She needed something. But unlike the same feelings she had experienced before, she knew what brought this on.  
  
Smoothing the damp hair at her temples, Tea cradled her eyes. The marks from the bright lights blinked fleetingly on the sight of her eyelids, wandering away to impossible places and fading out wistfully.  
  
Her forehead was sticky from the dry day. It was hard to ignore, but the barest traces of bile in the back of her throat proved to be much worse to forget.  
  
Tea rubbed her head again, weary enough to ignore the urge to adjust her position again, but she still twitched, blinking a few times afterward in what seemed like no reason at all. She had long since lost the purpose of the lesson, focusing instead on the quaintly atrocious hairdo her teacher sported every day; a gray ball of fluff fastened back simply with two oversized barrettes hanging near her ears.  
  
She wondered how long the woman had been recording fresh assignments and explanations on her expansive white board. Looking up at the clock, she saw it was only about five minutes.  
  
Tea groaned highly and softly, again, lowering her eyes.  
  
Blood pumped through her veins so angrily she felt it uncomfortably all over, pulsing, nagging at her to go--but she still stayed in her seat, determined, feeling her bottom lip tremble.  
  
/It's so close,/ she thought wildly /I can get what I want, and it's ~so close~./  
  
She shook herself roughly enough that her head spun, but it didn't really help that feeling of ~need~.  
  
Tea stared, trying to sit still.  
  
"So," the teacher began, breaking her pattern of strokes on the white board, and consorting her notes for reassurance. She continued speaking, but Tea didn't hear, as the sweaty, sticky surface of her skin bothered her immensely. Too immensely.  
  
It wasn't as relieving as it should have been when the class ended.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
The open hallways were slightly cooler, though not by much. Her locker offered a temporary reprieve with it's chilled surface, and she leaned on it tensely, feeling her right hand ball into a fist as it rested on the gray metal as well.  
  
The footsteps of routine passing time were as clear as ever to her ears, mingled irritatingly with the buzz and scuffles of the junior high students' routine banter.  
  
She felt a migraine coming one. Tea lightly struck her gray-painted locker with the tender fist that rested beside her pounding head.  
  
"Tea--are you alright?"  
  
"I'm fine." She muttered moodily to Yugi, but didn't open her eyes or look up in mutual greeting, so he took a step forward in concern. He had watched her earlier that morning, finding the girl restless and constantly uneasy with a feverish look on her face during the entire lesson.  
  
He frowned, adjusting the heavy textbooks in his arms.  
  
"I guess . . . " his tiny set mouth pinched to the side in a disapproving manner, not looking at all as if he believed her, but she didn't notice; her eyes were still shut very tightly.  
  
With a sudden jolt of startlement, he noticed that she was shaking.  
  
Tea felt as if she were breaking and cracking from the inside out, her sanity slowly exposing itself in a strange, routine and impractical-based world. For a second, she didn't think . . . just floated.  
  
"Well anyway," Yugi continued cautiously "I forgot to give you this before, but it's from Grandpa and I."  
  
It took another silent moment for her to regretfully rip her gaze to the innocent sight of Yugi, staring at him with a decidedly annoyed expression and a little glare. He stared up squarely and unafraid, furrowing his brows over his large loopy eyes while digging in his pocket.  
  
She swallowed. It seemed unnatural, and was a slightly painful contraction of her stress-dried throat, causing her to wince once when her head pounded twice.  
  
/What's happening to me./ she thought to herself vaguely.  
  
Yugi retrieved what he was looking for in a short manner of time, bringing them up to her with one last wistful look at their glossy surfaces. Truthfully, he didn't think Tea would take the gift very seriously, but games were something he understood in the whole entirety of things.  
  
People were often a different matter. /There are no rules in life, but people find so many ways to break them./ he thought sadly.  
  
She took the three small packets into her hand with a taught care, looking down at them with her eyeballs because she didn't dare move her head again. Foil flashed happily to her, letting the lovely colors wave incessantly up to her, joking and wandering her face, but it barely registered. She noted the shape of an ugly, brutish thing, located just under the now-famous title of;  
  
/"Duel Monsters"/  
  
"Do you play?" Yugi asked anxiously, still watching her every movement.  
  
Looking back to him dispassionately, she felt a flash in her mind, mingled with gaping pain and what should have been nausea. She licked her lips tensely.  
  
"No."  
  
"Oh." He began to cutely scratch the back of his head "Well--Grandpa owns a game shop, and that's the latest thing . . . it's actually pretty fun to play."  
  
Yugi laughed nervously, she grunted. With one last meaningless look at the glossy cover, she slipped it open, sliding out little cards in mint condition, almost as glossy as the cover, but in a different sort of way. They came out smoothly, identical on one side, gazing in haphazard colors on the other.  
  
Tea used two fingers to slide them out with a sort of control where she didn't have to remove the entire group of cards, as her cold, sweaty fingers slipped along their smooth surfaces. She pulled out two.  
  
"Some people say that you can predict the future with them." Yugi continued, a-matter-of-factly.  
  
She looked at him quizzically. "Like Tarot cards?" she asked dubiously and obviously annoyed.  
  
/This sounds like some sick trend./ Tea thought to herself, rolling her eyes mentally. /We'll have to watch out; there's going to be a whole new generation of obsessions that could fit in with the "Trekkie" crowds./  
  
"I guess." He replied, shifting his weight.  
  
/Yeah right./  
  
She winced when the cards she held shocked her abruptly, cursing them vilely under her breath for their inanimate moodiness. Every thing seemed to be against her today . . .  
  
. . . Except for the wide eyes of Yugi. Unbelievably weary, she sighed, knowing that through his kindness and supposed view of 'friendship', she couldn't oppose him. Not now, when he was staring at her so earnestly.  
  
That was the only thing that kept her from just falling against the locker in misery right then.  
  
Tea flipped over the cards in false interest, examining them as lazily as she could, because the monster in her head seemed to have other ideas regarding that situation.  
  
Happy, girlish, sickening colors assaulted her vision.  
  
One seemed to be a giant fuzz-ball with wings and a grossly wide smile. Her top lip curled up in distaste at it's look that clearly illustrated; 'I am so much better than you.' Naturally, the title proclaimed 'Shining Friendship' with all honors and heartiness worthy of a cheerleader on Prozac.  
  
She absently switched the two cards to view her second unfortunate selection.  
  
~Her~.  
  
/What?!/  
  
Wait--no. There was a woman with a staff, and a greenish complexion staring out blankly in what appeared to be a gaudy robe and high ponytail. The picture wasn' pretty, just powerful, strangely powerful as she felt her hand shaking.  
  
/Oh god,/ she thought wildly /I'm going insane. Fucking insane.  
  
/I saw ~me~ there./  
  
"What's wrong?" Yugi asked again, picking up a feeling of unease from his peer.  
  
Tea's head snapped up, now glaring at the unsuspecting boy. This was too weird--too pat, too ironic. 'Magician of Faith'?! What the hell was this? Was this meant to mock her, as a stupid girl who was destined to fail . . . Her lips pursed, he was startled into discomfort, wondering if he had done anything wrong.  
  
"Who do you think you are?!" Tea exploded, throwing three packs, one open and two unopened, at him and throwing her hands back in barely controlled rage. "You think you're clever?! That's the worst setup I've ever heard of!"  
  
Yugi's eyes widened.  
  
"This . . . ~disgusting~ superstitious crap is so corny." She hissed "I'm not stupid enough to not realize that you're setting me up for something like this ideal 'friendship' of yours, only for your little inside ~joke~."  
  
"B-but Tea!" Yugi protested, but she cut him off.  
  
"Go ahead and take your little 'gift' and give it to someone who cares." She deadpanned coldly "Like your little blonde buddy over there. You act like her enough already, so go off into your damn games.  
  
"And leave me out of it."  
  
She stalked off, leaving Yugi very confused, and feeling his eyes itch with threatening tears. He stared at the two cards on the ground. One tear dropped messily on the surface of the 'Magician of Faith'.  
  
Tea felt her headache multiply.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"Excuse me," Tea said through gritted teeth of longing "I'm not feeling too well."  
  
"Hope you get better soon, Miss Gardener." The teacher said, without looking up from his pile of homework.  
  
She didn't await further orders, gathering her things and leaving the room in a hazy hurry.  
  
Yugi saw her leave with concern, but knew his place in her eyes in that moment, and she didn't look back. Brow creased, he consorted his handwritten assignment again with a subdued frown.  
  
Tea had no intention of heading to the nurse's office. She knew nothing ~there~ would help her feel better. /Once more can't hurt, can it?/  
  
She shivered in anticipation, picking up her walking pace until her legs began to cramp up, but she didn't let up whatsoever. Her entire journey to the sakura tree was a free-flowing experience, and she felt herself relaxing to her craving slightly around each corner of the school.  
  
/ . . . Can it?/  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
She was lost, she supposed, because that was how it felt. She ~had~ lost. But that was not what her body was telling her, it was only what her mind was screaming.  
  
/Life would be so much easier without a brain./ Tea decided.  
  
And inhaled her savior.  
  
Benson was lost in a world of his own forgetting, sprawled out beside her in the same fashion that he had been when she came up the hill in her wobbly crutches, his pale eyes opened only haphazardly and his dreadlocks grinding into the dry, dead ground.  
  
A great deal of the grass had already blown away from it's home, leaving gaping lapses of dry dirt scattered about the entire field, not including the track. The horizon expanded in a hazy--nightmare. Bluer than blue, clear, and so distant; distancing itself from pathetic souls such as theirs.  
  
Exhaling, Tea cursed the sky under her breath, yearning for a storm again or something to get her out of her hazy partial-consciousness that she despised. She looked back down at him, though he was too far gone to notice, realizing his headphones had slipped down to his neck, pounding away extraordinarily enough she could hear a little--  
  
--She looked back to the horizon, as she felt herself go dizzy, looking at, but trying not to notice the spite of the sky.  
  
/So blue./ she hated blue; her eyes were that color.  
  
Dreaming, she had found, was an easier point of existence, and she was blissfully slipping into a dream without even trying. It was a wonderful feeling, and she felt, for once . . .  
  
. . . ~Peaceful~. She giggled.  
  
"Ga . . . Girly?" Benson croaked, turning to his side with a precarious wobble, as his head stayed limp and careless.  
  
She didn't answer, letting her actions, which seemed nothing more than numbness and so easy to execute, fall toward him in a slump. It didn't seem awkward to her at all, her head dug into his shoulder and feeling his fleeting heartbeat through her cheek.  
  
The way the wind blew through the deciduous trees, and the fact that it was the only sound excluding themselves. It was an uncomfortable sound, speaking only with loneliness, and she burrowed her eyes further into Benson's shoulder.  
  
"This' it. They're comin'." Tea barely heard, trying to ponder on his words instead.  
  
/When they come, I don't want to be here./ when her father would come home, she knew it would probably be with another woman who had dropped out of high-school, trying to act as though she was wiser than Tea herself, and never excepting the realization that perhaps she wasn't, or that the girl didn't care. They were all the same since her mother, even her aunt was that way, and instead of being as motherly to her as they tried, they only seemed untouchable; never understanding.  
  
She didn't know what her father saw in them, but she hated them.  
  
She hated them for trying to change her. For trying to drill her into something like themselves; lost and oblivious and ignorant to everything besides themselves.  
  
Deep inside, Tea wished she could be like them, but it hurt so much as she already understood how she could never be.  
  
Holding her breath so that her head spun, despite that her eyes were still shut as tightly as possible, she breathed out a dry little sob.  
  
"I don't want them to come."  
  
"Meneither."  
  
"I want it all to stop."  
  
"/Well I don't know but I've been told--you never slow down, you never grow old./" sang Benson's CD player. Tea wondered on it for a little bit.  
  
"It'll stop soon." Benson slurred in a weary tone "It'll all stop soon."  
  
" . . . How?"  
  
Only the music answered her.  
  
"/Tired of screwing up. Tired of going down, tired of myself . . . tired of this town./"  
  
"Me too." She whispered, feeling her eyelids tighten as water built up behind them.  
  
She wish she was better--at anything. Even dance, she had hoped so much that she was as good as it felt, but she wasn't good enough. Never good enough . . .  
  
It was painful when she realized that. And even in her drugged trance, it hurt her.  
  
"At least I won't hurt anymore." Said Benson vaguely.  
  
Tea opened her eyes.  
  
"How?" she demanded.  
  
"/Last dance with Mary Jane,/" the music echoed, enticingly "/one more chance to kill the pa-a-ain . . . "  
  
/Only one last chance?/ she wondered /Only one?/  
  
Benson didn't say anything, as he breathed steadily, she knew he wouldn't say anything more. Sighing into a swirly abyss, Tea fell back, opening her eyes blearily to a dry-brightened world, entrapping her.  
  
She stared at the tree, idly.  
  
/If there's only one more chance, then you would want the pain to go away forever./ she thought.  
  
There was only one forever; Tea looked at her hands in grim fascination, suddenly aware that no one could interfere this time. She could just--go away, and no one could stop her from escaping.  
  
Her brown hair trembled, as she began to laugh; happily.  
  
/My last chance . . . / she thought gleefully, searching through her bag, ransacking it with vigor, and eager to end it all.  
  
Finally, she found exactly what she was looking for, a sharp silver razor blade . . . ~*~*~*~  
  
Yugi slumped against his hand, feeling his cheek bunch up to the side as he stared to his elbow. He wasn't bored, precisely, just caught up in a stomach-tumbling sensation of profound dread.  
  
He practically flew out of his seat when the bell signaled his lunch hour.  
  
Even though he was very hungry, he noticed it stayed a back-space in light of that dreading feeling again, that became worse with each step in the direction of his locker. As his eyes were downcast, he didn't notice Annie stumbling up to walk beside him.  
  
"Hey Yugi," she said, still managing to sound cheerful, though she was obviously trying to be serious "are you okay?"  
  
"Huh? Oh--yes, I'm fine."  
  
"Are you sure?" she pressed "I mean, I saw you talking to that weird girl earlier, and she seemed kinda mean. I ~told~ you not to get mixed up with people like that; she's bad news."  
  
Yugi, looked at her in surprise, sunlight highlighting the edges of her hair and make-up dulling the shine on her cheeks, before returning his eyes to downcast. She was a nice girl, but there were some things for everyone that people just didn't understand.  
  
"Maybe," Yugi voiced instead, clearly disinclined to discuss the matter any further. Annie sensed his need for alone-time, biting her lip, unsure if it was wise for such a nice guy as him. She finally sighed mentally, and stepped in front of him, turning over her shoulder with a white smile as he jolted still in surprise.  
  
"Well, I'll save you a seat at lunch, I guess! See you."  
  
"Bye." Said Yugi, still distracted.  
  
He watched her go, but wasn't really seeing her cheerful form. /Why is it that I feel like I'm forgetting something?/  
  
Dragging his petite feet across the sunlight-glossy linoleum, he shoved his hands into his pockets, recovering the forsaken gift from before.  
  
Her words still stung, but he knew he was far from giving up in her case. Yugi frowned.  
  
It was strange, he knew she was sad, just ~knew~ it, yet she just pushed everyone away violently before they became too close--what was she afraid of anyway? Everyone needed someone, but she was forcing herself to nothing.  
  
She must have been tearing herself up from the inside. He wondered how someone so amazing had fallen into such a routine of self doubt and automatic pain.  
  
/Tea's an amazing person/, Yugi thought to himself, looking at the card in his hand /~she~ just needs to realize it, just like I have . . . / he fingered his puzzle, but this time, found no immediate comfort in the soft metal under his hands.  
  
/Hurt me?/ where had that thought come from? /No, she's hurting herself more than she'd allow herself to hurt me, I can tell. I guess she seemed a little weird earlier, a little grumpy, but that's it./  
  
Realizing, he chuckled. "I can't believe I'm trying to convince myself of something, weird."  
  
Yugi kicked a rock. Wait, a rock?  
  
His feet had unwillingly led him outside; the courtyard unless he was very much mistaken. Squinting at the sun, he wondered idly why there weren't any more students out, as it was an absolutely beautiful day.  
  
He sighed, watching a few girls giggle at the side of the school, happily enjoying the shade while they ate their sandwiches and discussed unimportant matters as a respite for the trying school day. They didn't notice him, or didn't care, but he smiled all the same.  
  
Happiness was contagious for him, he decided.  
  
Yugi surveyed the whole of the dry field, searching for anyone as pleasant company for lunch, because the cafeteria was looking much less inviting with each second at the sun.  
  
Squinting, he spotted small figures in the distance, mulling around the roots of a gigantic, sadly dying, tree. The shapes were peculiar.  
  
Suddenly, without warning, another huge wave of dread washed over him, seeming to drown his stomach as it sank no smaller than a few feet. His eyes widened--  
  
--and he found himself running over to the tree in distress. Not noticing how he seemed stronger than before, or taller, or even ~why~ he was running, trampling the ground carelessly as he felt the warm air rush past his cheeks and ears--  
  
--Yugi stopped, looking onto the figures in horror-  
  
--~blood~.  
  
"Wha--" Yugi felt helpless, his eyes widened to an uncertain degree, his breath coming in rapid gasps and in erratic increments. At first it was unbelievable, in his sheltered, innocently oblivious life . . .  
  
. . . But he had ~seen~ blood before.  
  
And he knew it who it belonged to before he even spotted her brown-haired, slumped figure.  
  
" . . . Tea . . . "  
  
Yugi trembled.  
  
He screamed.  
  
"TEA!"  
  
He ran to her side, with courage that he didn't know he possessed.  
  
"Oh--no. Ohno. SOMEBODY!!! Somebody, YOU HAVE TO HELP!"  
  
Without a thought, he brought her body into his arms, spotting her wrists as the culprits of her deadly mess. He couldn't do anything else--Yugi grabbed them with each hand, hoping it would work to bind them for now, hoping she would still be alive.  
  
/Of course she'll still be alive!/ his mind screamed.  
  
He screamed too, shriller and with more urgency than he knew he could do, caught up in instinctive distress, just trying for them to hear him . . . to help her, to help ~him~.  
  
/Ohno-ohno-ohno-ohno--/  
  
It all seemed like a bad dream. Her pulse was weak into his palms, her blood seeping dispassionately through his fingers, and dripping into fat droplets, staining the ground dark.  
  
"PLEASE!!! SHE'S STILL ALIVE, BUT WE HAVE TO HELP HER!!!"  
  
He began to go into a blank state, into shock. Distantly, he was aware of a few gasps and shrill screams that rung in his ears; terror unsheathed. Dimly, he heard the words;  
  
"H-hello? 911? There's--there's a-a girl here and--oh my god--her wrists are cut--"  
  
Yugi's eyes were so widened it was hard to see. He began to whisper, not daring to cry, because he couldn't help her if his hands went weak, if he was too caught up in his own fright.  
  
He leaned into her slowly. Trembling all over.  
  
"Oh Tea," Yugi saw everything go blurry "what have you done to yourself? Tea, you can't leave . . . you just can't . . . "  
  
The sirens didn't sound soon enough.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
. . . alright, I hated that chapter. I had writer's block regarding where to come from in this situation, and it's had me depressed all week.  
  
This is the most angst-ridden chapter I've ever written in my life.  
  
But the next will be the last in this story, and I can assure you, yet again (really, it's me who needs the reassurance), that everything will be resolved in it. This is a prequel to "The Sanctuary" after all.  
  
I'm really bad at stuff like this . . . and it didn't help that I was so disgusted with myself for the dry writing at the first section (it was supposed to be agonizingly long). Please tell me what I can do to improve it . . .  
  
And you guys had better come back for the ending. Tell me if you'd like to receive an e-mail when it comes out, which will be before school comes back, if I'm lucky.  
  
Again, thank you for actually sticking through this chapter, because I have a feeling my reader responses will become agonizingly sparse in response to this.  
  
Thank you. I mean it, so much.  
  
Please review, if you can.  
  
giggleplex 


	7. Teaching Her How to Smile

Before we begin, I would like to comment about the odd self-doubt Yugi was thinking in the last chapter, which was seemingly OOC. Well, my idea was set in place after I realized that he has the puzzle-even if he doesn't know about the existence of Yami yet. I'm sorry for not explaining it more excitingly, but I couldn't find any other way of saying it clearly, at this point in time.  
  
Expect a little more of that in this chapter ~_^  
  
The influence of the darker, fiercely protective side of Yugi-da-cutie ^^  
  
Kay. Enjoy--the last chapter of this story.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
"Will she be alright?"  
  
"Please, kid, get out of here."  
  
"But--"  
  
"Listen; /you're just in the way/."  
  
He stopped, with the group of grim-faced doctors continuing their way down the white-washed halls, as they didn't bother to look from their charge. He felt so helpless.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
Before I Fell Over the Rainbow: Climax  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
5:30.  
  
The last time he looked, it was 5:27, yet it seemed like so much more. His eyes were reddened from forgetting to blink, and tears, which he didn't even notice as they ran down his face, leaving dryness, yet had long since soaked the collar of his shirt.  
  
Yugi brought his knees to his chest, not finding any comfort as he usually did from the compact position. His weighted eyelids dropped, before they ultimately rested like lead onto his propped legs, and the blackness scattered in distress.  
  
He hiccupped, tightening the expression on his lips, decidedly uncaring as to if his shoes were soiling the seat. It was a horrible place, anyway.  
  
5:35.  
  
The room smelled of sealed plastic, artificial vegitation, and antibacterial cleaner. It was just as he remembered it; nothing ever good came from that smell, just as nothing ever came from the hospital in it's entirety.  
  
Such a sickly-clean, unnatural aroma such as that seemed to tell of a bad dream, but this was no dream . . .  
  
5:36  
  
. . . This was worse than a nightmare.  
  
He--had never dreamed of seeing death so close. His mother had been taken to the emergency room in the arms of his grandfather, doing his best to shield her cradled body from her innocent son, who didn't need to understand. Who didn't understand, until he saw her, enveloped in thin sheets and so wispy-looking that he wondered aloud.  
  
She had just smiled, and bid him goodnight as he was lead from the room. The truth was surreal to the imagined realities of a little boy, but in postponed time, he honestly realized that his mother wasn't going to come back home, jingle the keys through the hallways, kiss him on the forehead gently, stroke his hair with the motherly tenderness that only ~she~ could manage.  
  
Still, he fully understood that it wasn't her fault, even in the full- fledged midst of his racking sobs, late at night when she didn't rush in to comfort him.  
  
Yugi had heard the stories, but he had never truthfully figured that someone he knew would put themselves through such an abrupt fate intentionally. The idea puzzled him, it hurt him so so much.  
  
5:40. A woman in her late-30s had rushed in with unintelligible ravings, gesturing madly, and coughing up the shriveled remains of tears. As the receptionists attempted to calm her, she abruptly began to sob, all chances of understanding lost down her cheeks and adding to the years of sadness soaked further than anything through the carpeting.  
  
Yugi hugged himself, dropping his feet to the floor, shivering, and rocking back and forth, /back and forth/.  
  
A small child wailed, catching on to the lady's distress.  
  
/Or maybe it's just hungry./ Yugi thought, feeling salt sting his eyelids /Maybe . . . other people . . . don't think that way. Maybe even I don't./  
  
Well, he couldn't seem to save anyone, could he?  
  
He was just in the way.  
  
"E-excuse me."  
  
Yugi looked up to see a young woman with limp blonde hair, adjusting the burden of a toddler boy in her arms, clutching her close and sucking his thumb. She was also trailed by no less than three other children of varying ages, blinking in tired gasps of yawns and attempting to still their weary wobbling.  
  
Glancing around the stuffy room, lit by more lights than necessary, he also noticed that he was sitting in the middle of the largest gap of seating, simply staring in the comfort of his chair, while this family tried their best to just stay upright.  
  
"I know this sort of sounds rude, but," the woman swallowed, not making eye- contact. "i-if you could maybe--"  
  
"Oh, don't worry. I'll move."  
  
He forced a smile, but it choked him, as forcibly looked away so that they wouldn't notice anything. They seemed to have enough things to worry about, besides his pathetic attempts to stifle his inappropriate misery.  
  
The swinging doors opened from the inside, signaling the entire waiting room to take a sharp intake of breath as one. Innumerable sets of eyes pointedly followed the tired face of the doctor, as he walked to the desk, speaking in hushed tones.  
  
Stumbling over, Yugi couldn't help it. He had to find out.  
  
He didn't anticipate the wobbliness, but the counter in front of the receptionist was strong and inviting as he fell onto it without grace. The thin-faced woman behind the desk raised an primly plucked eyebrow, straightening herself haughtily.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
Yugi's head snapped up, forever grateful that he wasn't shaking as he swallowed the lump in his throat that had lain there for hours.  
  
"Is Tea all right?" he asked.  
  
The woman pursed her lips, tapping her pen on the hand rest in front of her keyboard, looking past him. "Who?"  
  
"Tea!" Yugi choked, his eyes widening "Tea Gardener."  
  
"Ah-ha." She commented dubiously "Are you a direct relative?"  
  
"N-no . . . "  
  
"Alright, then you'll just have to--"  
  
"Sina, this is the boy who brought her in--don't worry, I'll take him back."  
  
"Fine. Next!"  
  
Yugi stepped aside, watching the man in white with a reproachful gaze and wondering if he was really sincere in his assurances. He wanted to see ~Tea~, not some  
  
//--foul mortals, not understanding, not truthful, lieslies--alllies--//  
  
"This way."  
  
The tall doctor turned, rubbing his eyes from obvious exhaustion, and not helping matters by keeping his expression utterly and completely neutral; causing Yugi to start in wild horror, matching his pace despite his size.  
  
--5:52--  
  
As they skidded beyond the dispassionate swinging entrance to a dimly lit hallway, the small boy raced up beside him, cutting the doctor off with a slight fury that seemed unnatural for such a frail looking boy. It seemed odd even to ~him~.  
  
It wasn't important . . .  
  
"What happened." It was more of a prompt than a question, as Yugi folded his arms, the seas swimming in his eyes far from serene; the doctor stepped back in alarm, blinking rapidly. But only a little boy stood there, with profound and innocent concern.  
  
The man sighed, consulting the papers in his hand though they mentioned nothing of the girl they spoke of.  
  
"She'll be fine, as long as she gets some rest." He replied, warily "She's just fortunate that she didn't know how to properly slit her wrists . . . "  
  
//Is she?// Yugi found himself wondering. After all, it was she who had made that decision--  
  
/No! She's just . . . /  
  
But he didn't really have an answer for himself, he knew. So he nodded as was expected, and followed behind the doctor, mutely and compromisingly.  
  
A phone ringing, a muffled scream, a whish of the curtain opening.  
  
Yugi strode inside the make-shift room, trying to ignore everything about the hospital--but the way Tea was situated at that moment, described everything that a hospital was.  
  
Dimly, he supposed the doctor had pushed a chair under him just in time, because his legs instantly collapsed from the sight of her; probably a routine observation for the hospital staff. 'He saw her, he couldn't stand any more'.  
  
Routine.  
  
"T-Tea." He said in the scarcest of whispers, limply falling forward to the practical hospital bed, but his nose only reached the edge, his eyes closing for a second.  
  
He knew he couldn't live in a blissful, ignorant darkness of intentional blindness forever, so he collected himself quickly, opening his eyes to look at her, as her eyes had slowly turned to him. Yugi choked on a sob.  
  
She was tucked into the white sheets with uncharacteristic neatness, her arms above their surface, allowing the sickly transparent IV tubes to hang there stuck inside of her arms.  
  
Routine care.  
  
Tea only moved her heavy-lidded, watery eyes, not disturbing the unnatural lines embedded in her arms, and especially not the red one. He saw out of the corner of his eye a bag hanging at a rolling post next to her bedside, dripping on occasion, leaving Yugi feeling distraught, nauseous, and somewhat disgusted. The blood in his feet pumped strongly now, as if his feet had just suddenly become too wide for his shoes.  
  
It was hard to take 'she's be fine' as serious as he did before.  
  
Just a routine speech.  
  
Everything about the scene was unnatural. The loose linen sheet she sat in, the blinding white of her sheets, the blood dripping at her side, the physical appearance of ~weakness~, and the gauzy bandages smothering her ~self inflicted~ wounds on her wrists.  
  
Her name was all that his speechlessness would care to allow. So he stared.  
  
~*Drip. Drip. Drip.*~  
  
Yugi felt his eyes slide shut, trying vainly to ignore the haunting sound.  
  
" . . . Yugi . . . " she managed, shifting a hair, and signaling a start of agitation on her behalf from the two hospital employees standing in the background. It wasn't long before she gave up the movement; she was too weak to keep it up. Yet her voice turned cold, her expression a hard one of disinterest and depressed, grudging acceptance. It wasn't Yugi she had excepted, it was the fact that she was still there.  
  
" . . . Why . . . ?" Tea sniffled a little, tightening her eyes shut as Yugi shifted in his seat, carefully raising a shaking hand to rest on the immaculate linens.  
  
"Why not?" he heard himself say, in a stronger tone than he felt he could manage.  
  
"There was no reason for you to have done what you did."  
  
He didn't answer for a moment. Preparing a smile, his face was round when he faced her again, widened by a smile that he held onto for as long as he could--but they both knew each other well enough, observed each other's antics, to understand that he wasn't fooling anyone.  
  
They were watching each other warily, now.  
  
"I didn't want you to die." He said simply.  
  
She turned "There's no reason why I shouldn't have."  
  
"What do you mean?!"  
  
"There are so many people in this world, so many liked, so many hated. I was the kind that no one would have missed."  
  
"What are you talking about?!" Yugi flailed his arms up into the air, as they landed onto the surface of the bed, startling Tea into a light jump and an expression of profound quizzicality. "I--~I~ would have missed you! Is th-that so hard t-to realize . . . "  
  
She relaxed into dreary contempt, allowing her clear blue eyes--so unnaturally clear-to vaguely wander to the spotted white ceiling overhead. Yugi breathed and shook next to her. Tea didn't speak until he began to slow to just a tremble, and until he looked away, his lip shaking more than anything as his large eyes stared off to something indifferent.  
  
"You barely know me."  
  
"Why is it that I have the feeling that I know you more than anyone knows you at the moment?"  
  
She swallowed.  
  
"Tea, I--" he forced himself to a small smile, that really only looked like a sugar-coated grimace, smelling antiseptic and recently unsealed plastic. "I just want to . . . "  
  
"Do what?!" she demanded "Mock me again? I don't give a--"  
  
"I want to do what no one else has seemed to have done for you before. I want to listen to ~you~."  
  
Tea faltered.  
  
"You're quick to anger, quick to desperation. I just hope that you are quick to--love and friendship. Because the world is a very hard place to sensitive people; I know, because I'm one too and . . . maybe we can" he stopped for a moment, thinking it over "we ~will~ end up helping each other."  
  
/That was all I ever wanted./ she found herself realizing, as her voice was temporarily paralyzed by Yugi's unexpected speech. Tea cursed herself as a few fresh tears glistened extraordinarily over her eyes, finding that she just lacked the strength to stifle them, as the firm bandages around her wrists seemed to tighten.  
  
All she ever wanted.  
  
But why?  
  
/Does that really matter?!/ her mind screamed. Yeah, it did, because she didn't want pity . . .  
  
But really, she yearned ~understanding~, and--wasn't it worth it?  
  
"Yugi, I" She pursed her lips together, but only found that her eyes watered more than they did before. He felt his head tilt to the side with an expression that ecstasy was clearly reachable, but couldn't bring himself to.  
  
Yugi didn't know why. He just reached over carefully, hugging her around her neck until her gaps of sobbing slowed, stifled in his t-shirt and calmed with readily given warmth and comfort.  
  
Tea couldn't push him away, but probably wouldn't have anyway. It was embarrassing--however, she found, she didn't care, because it felt so ~nice~. Which resulted in the faint recollection of her deceased mother, causing her to sob even harder, more uncontrollable.  
  
"It's alright." He cooed quietly into her ear "Everything will be okay."  
  
"N-no . . ."  
  
"It'll be fine, because I love you. And I'll always love you."  
  
The sobs stilled suddenly, her stomach tightened. Had she heard--  
  
Had she heard that correctly?  
  
"I'm telling you, LET ME IN! That's my ~daughter~ in there!"  
  
"Please sir, just wait a moment--she's been drugged and she'll have to rest very soon--"  
  
"God dammit, ~do you think I care~?!"  
  
The curtain whisked open again, revealing a frazzled-looking businessman, as if unsure of what he should feel in that situation. After immediately spotting the two students, his face tightened to what he had obviously hoped was an expression of impassiveness, but it was too transparent, backed by too much grief.  
  
Yugi slowly detached himself from Tea, stepping away from her side as who he supposed was her father stepped to. This wasn't his discussion.  
  
"What did you think you were doing?"  
  
"I tried to kill myself." She replied, her eyes flashing with defiance and slight annoyance.  
  
He gaped like a fish. Distantly, Tea heard Yugi excuse himself from the conversation and walk outside of the curtain.  
  
She wished he didn't leave. It was so much easier to understand things with his support, his comments on humanity and happiness; things that she had explored very little in the past.  
  
But this was her mistake, her choice, her confession, her father. And her father seemed to be at a loss for words from her slicing honesty.  
  
Tea thought of how she just wanted to scream at him at him at that point, how she wanted to painfully remind him of all of his mistakes that she could only explain in such a situation as they were now. But Yugi--Yugi made everyone understand with calm words and thoughtful expressions.  
  
He wasn't wearing his sunglasses.  
  
"I'm sorry." She said finally "I'm sorry that I never talked to you--about mom. About things."  
  
He couldn't let his emotions stay confined in their lonely prison; nine feet behind his eyes and falling somewhere in the bottomless pit region of his stomach. Harry Gardener faltered.  
  
"No." he heard himself say "It was my fault. All my fault. If I had only talked to you . . . ~damn~. Maybe you wouldn't have gone out and done this-- "  
  
"Dad," it was a word she had not used in a very long time.  
  
They both started.  
  
"I-I think it was as much of my fault as it was yours."  
  
"Probably."  
  
"God. It's hard to talk about these sort of things." He scratched his unkempt head, pondering the light, not allowing himself to cry just yet.  
  
"If y-you ever want to talk a-about mom." She fidgeted "I'll be here to listen. B'cause we're the only people that really understand about it, and-- "  
  
He didn't allow her to finish, suddenly breaking out into lengthened weeping, talking of things, talking of nothings, and she listened.  
  
And strangely, she understood.  
  
But she was so tired . . .  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"Tea-girl--Tea-girl--oh ~god~ . . . "  
  
"Please, miss, wait."  
  
Whish of the curtain.  
  
She blinked away a bit of blurriness, Tea couldn't begin to decode the absolute blur of a person leaning over her anxiously, but she certainly recognized the voice.  
  
"Gloria?" she said weakly, still sleepy.  
  
"Oh dear, oh dearie . . . why did you go and ~do~ this to yourself . . . because we care, I care and ~oh~" the form shifted. "if it was Swan Lake it's okay and I'll fand a good place to put you because we still have time, and I found the name of this great physical therapist that will have your foot up in ~no~ time, no time at all--"  
  
She was babbling.  
  
"Shh, shh, she's trying to sleep right now . . . "  
  
That was her father.  
  
"But!" Gloria protested.  
  
The world faded again, as Tea fell back into a comforted dreamland, oddly including some very large, very purple eyes . . .  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
"So you'll be out today? That's great!"  
  
Yugi turned to her, rewarding her with a large sincere smile, his eyes twinkling. He had come with his grandfather a while prior, with a similar grin and a stuffed bouquet of extremely aromatic pink lilies, which he was adjusting right now.  
  
The nurse snatched the flat, plastic thermometer from under her tongue, checking it closely, before throwing it away and busying herself with a mound of paperwork.  
  
"Yes." She tried lamely, wishing she was better at talking to people.  
  
He sat down with an exuberant bounce.  
  
"Tomorrow's Saturday, so you'll be okay for homework and stuff, but I doubt you'll be feeling like doing something like ~that~, huh."  
  
"I don't know . . . "  
  
"Hey, I know!" his eyes lit up spectacularly "Why don't we go to the arcade tomorrow?"  
  
"Um, okay." She managed a quavering smile "But I'm not that good at games."  
  
"That's alright! They're just for fun, anyway!"  
  
"Tea-girl," Gloria came into the room sporting a pleasantly sing-song voice and her denim-jacket in hand "how are you doing?"  
  
"Okay I guess." She tried smiling again. It was a little easier.  
  
Tea was grateful that no one so far had mentioned her failed attempt that led her here; and the carefree, casual way they spoke to her was comforting her wonderfully, feeling a bit of the mood rub off to her.  
  
She was learning how to smile again.  
  
"Lilies," Gloria pondered the healthy flowers "I love lilies. I remember in my first production with a major part, I was Clara, and they gave me pink lilies at the end of one of the showings."  
  
She giggled fondly.  
  
"I tripped off of the stage."  
  
They all laughed, though Tea's seemed wild and unnatural to her--  
  
"You need to smile more." The woman next to her commented "You have one of the prettiest smiles I've ever seen."  
  
Tea blushed "I'm not pretty."  
  
Yugi put a hand on her shoulder, as Gloria managed to recover a hand-sized mirror from her purse, not hesitating to shove it in front of her, forcing herself to look. But Tea saw a gaunt, thin face 'framed' by a big brown mess and downcast eyes.  
  
"Now smile." They prompted.  
  
She tried. But it must have been overrated . . .  
  
"Oh dear," Gloria clucked disapprovingly "I guess you can't smile in front of yourself, but will you take our word for it?"  
  
Hesitantly, she nodded.  
  
"Your father couldn't come right now," she continued "but he stayed up all night--"  
  
"--Watching you." Yugi finished "I think he loves you a lot."  
  
They chatted incessantly, relaxing and laughing into themselves, and opening up to each other readily enough.  
  
Tea wondered the whole time how lucky she was to have someone like Yugi come into her life. A friend as selfless as Yugi.  
  
He certainly contrasted from her more recent friends . . .  
  
/--Benson--/  
  
Benson . . . /ohno/  
  
"Benson!"  
  
She abruptly began to scramble out of her bed, feeling her face drain in absolute horror. In the self-centered haze of her misery;  
  
She had completely forgotten about his.  
  
"What's wrong?!"  
  
"Dearie--"  
  
"Benson!" she gasped "We have to help him! He's going to die!"  
  
/He might already be dead./ she found herself realizing, only tugging on the linens harder.  
  
"What are you talking about?" Gloria asked quizzically, concerned.  
  
"~Please~." Her eyes were dulling with desperation "I have to see if he's alright--even if it means CRAWLING there by ~myself~!"  
  
She tried to dash out, ended up limping, and was easily caught by Gloria's concerned arms, making her look up through her wild concern, and be startled into listening.  
  
"Die?"  
  
"PLEASE!" she squirmed.  
  
"Tea, you're not going anywhere without us." She said grimly, nodding at Yugi.  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
As it was, she was too late.  
  
Tea felt disgusted with herself, so stupid and so gross. She had been laughing--  
  
--~laughing~--  
  
--Stupid and dangerously ignorant of everything. And here was the one who deserved it all.  
  
They had simply dashed into his house after finding it. The door was unlocked; inviting.  
  
His body lay in the hall. A far from honorific memorial to what he once was, as alive as they were, and a caring person behind his own problems, only wishing the best, as he knew the worst. The world was already sadly lacking of caring people, Tea realized.  
  
She couldn't cry. She couldn't howl. She could only stare in horror, at the mutilated corpse, soaking the cheap hard floor with a lovely shade of crimson, and oblivious to the world.  
  
Tea stared, as the other two cried in anguish, even if they didn't understand, and never knew him.  
  
She said something to them that went for a universal excuse, just wanting to distance herself from it all--but knowing that it was impossible. From around the house, she spotted a small table that was crooked from a broken leg.  
  
There was a note on the table, complete with wild scribbles, of only wild thoughts, written in a wild daze.  
  
The only recognizable words were 'Erin', 'help', and 'sister'.  
  
'Help my sister. Erin.'  
  
'/Erin: 456-8281/' taped on the refrigerator, over the faux-wooden surface.  
  
Only then, did she cry, vowing on behalf of Benson's last selfless wish.  
  
/I'll protect--Erin. Forever, Benson, forever. I'll do for her what I couldn't even manage for you./  
  
~*~*~*~  
  
It's funny, but I've always realized, always surprised, that no matter how bad things are, life goes on. You can learn, understand, and then simply live with that realization. Maybe it's just instinctive that we expect life to be fair, because we feel bad when it is demonstrated clearly that such an ideal is never the case.  
  
Oh well, I have learned that it hurts not to try.  
  
I kept some of Benson's things, gathering them before the police arrived at the scene, cleaning as they cleared away his essence and mumbled obscenities referring to what a 'nuisance' something like this was. Gloria somehow managed to gather Yugi and I into her car before any news-casters arrived to feed incessantly from our grief and our story, as Yugi seemed distant, and I clutched a shoebox full of things that made him the Benson I knew.  
  
Including his sister's lonely-looking phone number. I called her later, and though she was profoundly distraught over the unwelcome news, we talked, and later Erin admitted that she felt better from talking. Both of us agreed that friends were better than anything to our grief, to our sanities and we ended the conversation from 'good morning' to 'good night'. Dad didn't mention anything.  
  
As it turned out, Yugi and I went to the arcade the next day as planned, just living. We amused ourselves so well that we scheduled an 'arcade adventure' for every Saturday, which we still do, actually, but with more tag-along people than just the two of us.  
  
I often mused at how it was possible for someone as young, and as seemingly innocent as Yugi had become so wise.  
  
His generosity, his acceptance of ~me~ was something I had never gone through in all of my existence. And knowing I could always count on Yugi, allowed a reassurance to addle my mind; that I would never be lonely again.  
  
I can't even begin to explain how wonderful it was to realize that.  
  
There are other people, I'm certain, that are out there, as lonely as I was. I used to think such an untouchable phenomenon as 'friendship' was just a corny falsehood in real life. But life was never meant to be spent unhappily.  
  
So I'm determined, more than anything to make sure people ~know~ that, even if they don't understand. Most dismiss such ravings as just idiotic.  
  
But there are some--who I can tell have discovered what I have learned from my friends, and particularly from Yugi. Such as Ryou, and his curiously feeble ways, his discomfort of himself that drowned out everything else. Or Malik, and his blank stare, confused as everything he once knew only proved to be unimportant in the entire scheme of things.  
  
Though they never admitted it in front of the others, they thanked me directly when no one else was paying attention, and that was worth it all.  
  
But I can't pretend that the jeering and raised eyebrows at my heated assurances of friendship, hurt a little. They hurt a lot, actually.  
  
I once asked Yugi if I just didn't understand people, if I was too idealistic for myself.  
  
He offered that maybe I understood people too well, that they just didn't allow themselves to look back into their own minds. People are all idiots inside. Fun-loving, friendship-craving, angry idiots, I think.  
  
Once Yugi and I learned that together, we realized how much we had grown; that we were out of our childhood once we figured out that thought by ourselves. Together, I'm certain we can do anything possible.  
  
And Yugi's constant mark on my life didn't end there.  
  
Gloria had begun taking me out--shopping of all things, every week. We rarely bought things, but I found the participation of just discovering new things, and giggling without much thought, but a great deal of care for the world, was a most fun pastime.  
  
Dad and Gloria became friends. Then very ~good~ friends.  
  
Then he proposed.  
  
It was a very odd wedding. My father had actually picked ~Yugi~(!) to be his best man, unknowingly as Gloria chose ~me~(!) to be her maid of honor. I hated the dress, finding that I had only about a half of the chest to fill up the bust properly. We were so clumsy and made absolute fools out of ourselves; accidentally dislodging flowers from the seats as we walked by, me tripping over Gloria's beautiful wedding dress, and (heaven forbid) us having to ~dance~ together. In all of our teenage clumsiness and flaming embarrassment.  
  
They took pictures of us, which I later hid away, secretly. But they had copies.  
  
It was the most embarrassing moments of my life, but it was fun. And I found that I had no trouble referring to her as 'mom' from there on. We're a happy family. Even Yugi seems like a natural addition.  
  
I still, to this day, do not know what he meant in the hospital with 'I love you'. It was probably just an offer of friendship, but though I keep reminding myself of that, I couldn't help but fall in love with ~him~. That's right, the short, wide-eyed kid with the weird hairdo.  
  
I love him.  
  
Now, it seems like I've . . . known him forever. We grew up, leaning on each other, learning, laughing . . .  
  
Living on. Together. And I don't mind if he doesn't actually love me, though he never mentioned anything like that, because I love him more than anything, and I'm at that fanatical stage where I'm fiercely protective, and will do anything to make sure he's happy.  
  
I've even grown an odd, more wary fascination with his darker side that he seems so taken with. It sounds strange, even to me, to admit that I love two people--spirits so much, even if, technically, they're the same person.  
  
But it's okay. Because I'll never tell them.  
  
Yugi's happy, I'm happy.  
  
I'm still in contact with Erin, I have a family.  
  
I try to express how wonderful it is. How wonderful friends are.  
  
'I want to do what no one else in your life has done. I want to listen to ~you~.'  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
~~~fin~~~  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
*sniffle* It's really pathetic that I'm crying now . . . as it's my story. But I couldn't help it after the last 'confession' that went on for a few pages (2.5). That should (hopefully) sum up everything, and my general idea that people can't be that committed to a cause, without experiencing the flip-side.  
  
For example, it's hard to realize how horrible war is, without being in it, like the Vietnam vets.  
  
Think back on yourself; think of the flip-sides you have experienced in your life, and you might figure out how that feels.  
  
NOW! I can start the first chapter of a very ambitious AU, co-writing with Yami Krissy (if she approves of the idea ^^;;;). TELL ME IF YOU'D LIKE INFO SENT WHEN IT COMES OUT!!!  
  
I can never express my thanks enough. Thank you, everyone. If I thought I could type out everyone's name without ending up giving you each a lengthy paragraph of thanks, and therefore be here for the next day or two, I would. But I'm sorry; you'll just have to make do with this general note ^^  
  
I've read my reviews so many times. Every. Last. One. So many times.  
  
I could never bring myself to finish this without your support.  
  
I hope this fic was an overall, enjoyable, thought-provoking experience for you all, despite the fact that I'm a rather untalented writer ^^;;;  
  
Thankyouthankyouthankyou!  
  
~_^ I'll see you around!  
  
giggleplex 


End file.
